


Light On The Horizon

by thegingermidget



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Eventual Romance, F/F, Mostly Phasma compliant, Oral Sex, POV Alternating
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-08
Updated: 2018-03-10
Packaged: 2019-01-10 18:09:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 55,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12304755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegingermidget/pseuds/thegingermidget
Summary: The crack in the surface of Starkiller that conveniently separated Finn and Rey from Kylo didn't happen. Instead, Finn and Rey were separated. Finn was rescued by Chewbacca and Rey was once again captured by the First Order.Things are working a little differently this time. While licking their wounds from the defeat on Starkiller, Rey is kept far from Kylo Ren while she is in custody but becomes close to someone else on the Finalizer.Phasma has kept herself distant from everyone in her life, but Rey manages to slip between the cracks in her armor.





	1. Chapter 1

Phasma clawed her way out of the trash compactor and into complete chaos. Klaxons rang out, the alarm much louder in the main corridor than in the snarling hell pit she’d escaped.

She threw off her helmet with a growl. After surviving its ordeal, the helmet was dented and caked in grime. Without looking down she knew the rest of her once glorious silver armor was in a similar state.

Stormtroopers and officers alike streamed past her in the hall without taking notice of her; barking orders and stumbling into one another as the passed. The helmet was lost in the shuffle almost instantly.

Anger and frustration boiled up all at once. She seized the nearest stormtrooper by the breastplate and demanded a status report.

“The base is collapsing. Emergency evacuation procedures have commenced.” The trooper managed to keep some semblance of composure before his superior officer, despite clear panic and tears welling in his eyes. Phasma could not find the same sense of decorum and swore loudly before releasing him.

She refused to let herself panic. Her anger at even being in this situation prevented that. It helped her think clearly. How was she going to get out of this?

It seemed like divine intervention when she found an escape at last. A few high ranking officers had commandeered a small shuttle as their escape pod off-world. They wasted no time in taking off from the now-fiery surface of Starkiller Base.

Outside the small shuttle window, large volcanic fissures opened wide in the crust of the planet, revealing gaping chasms of molten rock. That was when Phasma realized that they weren’t leaving. The planet that should have been shrinking from sight was very present in their view. They weren’t leaving, they weren’t even out of orbit.

There were only five officers on the ship. Two were busy piloting the damn ship with General Hux standing over them stone-faced. Lieutenant Mitaka was consoling a distraught Thanisson off to the side. The shuttle seemed both too small and far too empty. With the blare of the alarms far below them now, it was also very, very quiet.

“General,” Phasma insisted against the morbid silence. “Why aren’t we leaving?”

It was Mitaka who answered. The General did not seem to even acknowledge that a question had been asked of him. Only an involuntary twitch in his expression signaled recognition of the disturbance in the quiet of the shuttle. “We must collect Kylo Ren.”

At last, she found the strength to hold back the anger she felt. There was a certain strength one needed in order to hold one's tongue, a hard-won discipline.

The shuttle touched down just before a great tectonic crack in the planet's surface. The pilots manned the controls, ready to leave momentarily. The remaining officers ran to grab Ren and get out of there as soon as possible.

Phasma didn't see the girl before blood and burned flesh and viscera stained her clothes. She had been standing in the snow, not ready to fight or to flee, just standing. Hux lowered his blaster, expression unchanged.

"The girl comes with us," Hux said and Phasma made it so.

She was practically unconscious when Phasma lifted the girl into her arms. Her frame seemed bird-like but not weak. Brown hair clung to her damp cheeks. Her eyes were wide open but unseeing. Phasma couldn’t feel how cold she was through her own armor, but the girl’s bare arms were as white as the snow all around them. Her body seemed too cold to even shiver.

Thanisson and Mitaka each draped one of Ren’s arms over their shoulders. Hux looked on. He saw Ren’s lightsaber cast aside in the snow and stooped to retrieve it. 

There wasn't much space inside the shuttle. With Kylo Ren being laid out along the set of seats, there was nowhere for Phasma to put the girl. She began to lower her to the shuttle floor where at least the girl could sit.

As soon as she returned to solid ground, the girl, Rey, tried to stand. She was out of it, for sure, but was determined not to give in to the desire to close her eyes even just for a minute. It was clear she was disoriented from the way she felt her way along the wall until she was able to stand. Tired arms struggled feebly to defend against Phasma’s attempts to keep her from falling.

The shuttle took off with a shudder and Phasma lunged forward to keep Rey from falling. “You have to sit down,” she ordered.

Rey’s wild eyes dimmed slightly. Adrenaline was pumping through her veins, forcing her to be more awake than ever. Phasma had seen the same look in her stormtroopers after battle. She had felt that rush of energy that masks all pain yet heightens all senses.

“You’ve been shot. You have to sit down.” It was very likely the girl couldn’t feel much of anything anymore, let alone the pain from her blaster wound which should have been crippling.

“Why... Finn...” You could practically see the hundreds of different thoughts running through her head. The shuttle shook violently again and Phasma held out an arm to keep her from sliding down the wall.

“You have to sit down, now,” Phasma repeated the command and it seemed to register this time. The girl looked Phasma in the eye, comprehending little of her current situation.

She slid down the wall to sit on the floor.

Her hands fisted in her hair, reaching for something tangible. Phasma thought she looked so small there on the floor. She’d been so tall in the snow like she’d radiated so much power and energy to become larger than life. The girl’s body shook with dry sobs.

“Hey,” Phasma said to her. “You’re ok.” She wasn’t sure if she heard a harsh laugh from the girl or more tears.

Rey swallowed thickly and actually began to laugh. It was quickly subdued by a hiss of pain.

“That’s going to get worse before we can get treatment for it.” Phasma moved the girl’s hands away from her side.

Rey looked up at her. “Why would you even bother healing me?”

Phasma didn’t have an answer for that one. Her eyes drifted down to the lip Rey was biting to keep herself composed. “You’re alive for now. Anything else is something to worry about later.”

“I guess you’re right. It could always be worse.” She shifted position and winced again. “Though I can’t quite imagine that at the moment.”

There was something about Rey that was electric. She had a spark that lit everything she did, even when that spark was being consumed by her current injury. How could someone make small talk after being shot?

Phasma floundered for words. Instinct told her that talking was good, distraction was better. If a patient, a soldier, a girl could talk, it meant they were alive and had the potential to survive. This girl would live if she had anything to do with it.

“Are they always like that?” Her eyes followed Rey's curt nod towards the opposite corner. She saw the General knelt beside Kylo Ren.

“No.,” said Phasma. “Not really.”

Rey made an effort to slow her breathing. She, too, was making an effort to stay awake. “I don’t believe I caught your name.”

“Phasma.”

“I’m Rey, but perhaps you already knew that.” Was that a smile on her face? Granted it was twisted tightly into a grimace, but it was so… light.

It took a few hours to reach the Finalizer. Orders had been sent in advance to make sure that the ship was well out of the blast radius. The tiny officer’s shuttle had only just escaped. 

They were some of the only survivors of the catastrophe. As they disembarked, every crew member’s face was solemn. Kylo Ren and Rey were taken to the Med Bay immediately. General Hux cut right through the crowd that had gathered around the vessel. And Phasma? Phasma had no idea what to do. 

What if she had died on Starkiller? What if she hadn’t made it out? Faced with the shocking loss of so many people and the sense of uselessness she felt right now, it didn’t seem like it would make a difference whether she had lived or died.

Under normal circumstances, Phasma might have punched anyone who told her to do something. It was a defense mechanism, honed in her time working through the ranks. If someone who wasn’t her superior tried to give her orders, they didn’t do it twice. 

She wasn’t sure who told her to get some rest, but she was thankful that someone did. Otherwise, she might have spent hours just staring into space over a meal someone had placed in front of her, or watching debris float past outside a window. At least now she could do it in the privacy of her own quarters.

In a few hours, Hux gave her orders to take a cycle to recuperate. Workers who had been stationed on the Finalizer originally were working overtime to accommodate the influx of Starkiller refugees and the latest orders from high command. The hyperdrive had been damaged in a rebel attack that happened simultaneously with the assault on Starkiller Base. Repairs would need supplies and supplies required time and a destination, all being planned at light speed.

Her rooms were sparse; not really hers at all and meant for any officer of her status who happened to be on board. She had no possessions to differentiate hers from any other but didn’t necessarily mind it that way. There was no way she could become attached to one posting or set of rooms and she needed to be ready to fly across the galaxy at a moment’s notice. No time to become sentimental.

The first thing she did was shower. There was no telling what was caked to her armor, but it hadn’t forced its way underneath. Water for bathing purposes was a waste of valuable resources, but she’d never really had too many showers like that. She was more accustomed to sonic showers, far more efficient and sanitary. They weren’t designed to be comfortable or relaxing, but Phasma closed her eyes and leaned into the vibrations.

Then, she returned to her quarters and sat down, realizing that she hadn’t stopped moving for almost a day now. It was a bit like regaining your bearings on planet after spending time in space; the world seemed to shift slightly before becoming normal once again. From there, it wasn’t long before she found herself waking up from a few hours of sleep. 

After checking the time, she learned she had a few more hours in her day of rest. She didn’t need them. She was fine. Nothing was preventing her from getting back to work this instant, but obedience held her back. There was no harm in following the General’s orders; she could wait.

With nothing to occupy herself with for one of the first times in her life, Phasma was without a purpose. Her life had become a series of test and training exercises, what was she to do now? With a mental jolt, she reminded herself that this was only temporary, she’d be back to work tomorrow with plenty to do. She needed to rest, and so she did. 

Her legs did not seem to agree and they took her instead, traitorously, to the med bay. If asked why she had come, Phasma wouldn’t have been able to respond. No one did, and for this, she was tremendously relieved. There was no reason for her to be here, but she knew exactly why she had come.

She found Rey easily enough. Both the girl and Kylo Ren had been removed from the main treatment floor and placed in a separate area for both security and privacy. They lay, both unconscious on parallel tables with droids and humanoid attendants. 

There was a sheet of glass separating Phasma from either of the charges and she was able to look on in complete anonymity.

A droid was perched beside the girl’s abdominal wound, applying bacta and helping cells rebuild. That was her only major wound and after only a few hours of treatment, some of her vivacity was returning. Her skin was regaining its color and a sheen of sweat lay across her brow. Her face was calm, but concentrated as though she were focusing all powers she possessed on healing herself.

A continuously updating status report on a datascreen outside the room assured Phasma that she was not conscious. It also told her that Rey would make a full recovery within the next day which seemed surprisingly fast.

She was about to leave when someone came and stood beside her, looking in on the treatments being administered inside. It was the General, his arms folded and still looking a little more worse for wear than herself. The wild look in his eyes that she had glimpsed on Starkiller had faded and he looked more tired now than anything. He likely hadn’t gotten the few hours of sleep she’d been able to.

Neither of them said a word at first, but Phasma knew better than to try to leave. 

“I won’t ask you what you’re doing here,” Hux said at last. “Though I would be a bit surprised to learn we have the same purpose here.”

Phasma tried to respond but wasn’t sure she knew what the General was getting at. 

“Perhaps he was right, she’s far stronger than we could have guessed.” Phasma knew exactly who ‘he’ referred to. “A bit like yourself, in fact.” To both of their surprise, Phasma didn’t recoil instantly at the comparison. “And I don’t mind that you’re becoming attached.” He didn’t take his eyes off of the inert form of Kylo Ren whom the droids and medical officers were preparing for full body bacta immersion.

“Sir, I’m-” she tried to protest but he held up a hand.

“If only in the sense of kinship. I do not mean to pry Captain, as to what your feelings are. Your presence here indicates you feel something for the girl even if it is only curiosity that brings you to her bedside.”

Phasma straightened back her shoulders, not sure she understood where this conversation was headed. 

“This girl, Rey, has already shown that she has the potential to change everything. I am not foolish enough to hope that we can fully sway her to our cause as the Supreme Leader believes.” Her mouth went dry at his mention of their shadowy commander. “But should I ask it, you will do everything in your power to make it so. Understood?”

“Sir?”

“I’m not asking for anything right away, but when the time comes be ready.”

“Yes, sir.”

She gave the girl inside one last look before she left. Something about her made Phasma ache inside and another part of her didn’t want to leave until Rey’s eyes flickered open once more.

She forced herself to leave the med bay leaving General Hux at the window. She wondered if he was feeling something similar right now, and didn’t have the strength she did to leave.


	2. Chapter 2

Feeling returned to her body before she was anywhere near awake. She wasn’t in pain, not anymore, but she was stiff and fragile like a bone in a cast. 

It took a while for Rey to realize that she was not awake. Almost like lying in bed on a Sunday morning, when you come out of sleep only when you start to think more and more. Lucid dreaming becomes thought and soon enough you realize that you should probably start your day even though there is no pressure to do so. Awareness came slowly and then she jolted into consciousness. 

Bright light filled her senses before she learned anything else. It was the artificial light of a starship meant for humans who never saw the light of day. Her eyes adjusted and she tried to sit up from where she lay. Several instruments and machines made noise all at once, wordlessly screaming at her to lie back down. 

It felt good to move again. Her body was weightless after days of disuse. She propped herself up on one hand and the other went to her side where the blaster bolt had gone through. The wound had healed with a fist-sized angry scar on both sides. The new skin was pink and mostly smooth because it had been left to heal for days with the help of bacta. Moving around was creating a few wrinkles.

“Please lie down, miss.” said a woman in gray. “We didn’t think you’d wake up so soon.”

“Where am I?” Her voice was dry and brittle, and the woman gave her a sympathetic look. 

“You’re in the medical bay. I’m Medical Officer Drehma and I’ve been monitoring your condition.” She didn’t offer any sort of answer to Rey’s question, but it looked like she felt sort of bad about it.

Rey was not about to offer sympathy. As Drehma busied herself about Rey’s vitals and various datapads filled with numbers, memory of the last few days came back to her in flashes. At points, she was tempted to believe that it had all been a bad dream. Eventually, she had to admit that only as strange a set of circumstances as those could lead her to a First Order Med Bay.

She was about to question Drehma again when she noticed someone else in the room floating in a vat of blue liquid. Kylo Ren bobbed about in restless sleep, numb to the rest of the world.

Drehma rushed forward to grab her when Rey attempted to leap from the examination table. Every instinct told her to run as far and as fast as she could. She never wanted to be in the same room as him ever again.

“Let me go!” she shouted as she wrestled in Drehma’s grip. Two new figures entered the room and forced her bare arms behind her back with gloved hands.

Drehma straightened her uniform out, its crisp lines crumpled by Rey’s hands. “I’m not sure you understand your situation here, miss, but don’t worry. As soon as I deem you ready, you’ll be told everything you are allowed to know.” The gentleness in her features had vanished in conflict and Rey was sad to see it go.

The men held her still as Drehma finished taking a few more tests on Rey’s condition. The process involved syringes and pumps, a droid or two, and a datapad she logged all the data into.

“You recovered far more quickly than we expected. Your injuries should have kept you out of commission for at least another cycle,” she looked over at Kylo Ren’s tank. “But, some force users have been known to have accelerated healing. You should be free to go in an hour or so, once I’ve gotten you cleared.”

“Where am I supposed to go?” 

She looked up from her datapad. “What did I tell you about questions? All will be answered, but certainly not by me. Far above my clearance.”

Rey was very confused and more than a little upset at being physically restrained. She looked up at the blank helmets of her stormtrooper captors. The blank expressions on their helmets offered no sympathy.

Fine, thought Rey. She could wait.  
\-------------------------------------  
Far across the galaxy, another group of fighters was licking their wounds. The victory on Starkiller Base had also come at a heavy price: the Hosnian System. The mood amongst the Resistance was not entirely celebratory.

Everyone was thankful for their lives. They had come within minutes of being obliterated and had put a stop to having it happen again, at least for now. There was nothing to stop the First Order from building another Starkiller. Thoughts like that kept festivities to a minimum.

Drinks were passed around while most people moved to pack as much as they could as quickly and orderly as possible. Now that the First Order knew the location of their rebel base, it was long past time to leave. With enemy forces scattered after the destruction of their base, the Resistance had a decent window of time to find a new center of operations.

General Organa had already designated the location of their new base. The moving process had already begun, as soon as the threat on D’Qar had been declared. With any luck, all signs that they had ever been here would be gone in two cycles. The General did not plan on leaving for another day, stubbornly insisting that she would make sure everyone got away safely before making the move herself.

She was not the only one who was reluctant to leave. 

In the hours since he had returned, Poe Dameron had not left Finn’s bedside. The medical center was full of activity, but he didn't seem to mind being at the center of it. 

The doctor’s had placed Finn into a coma due to the severity of his injuries. Healing him would take some time, but they were certain he would make a full recovery. This is not what kept Poe at Finn’s bedside. No, it was the feeling that Finn was trying to tell him something. 

He should have disregarded this feeling as absurd. Hell, it still sounded absurd to him, but here he sat.

Finn didn’t want to leave the base yet. At this point, Poe was almost certain. He didn’t know how and he had no idea why, but he was sure that this was the message Finn was trying to get across.

Why didn’t he want to leave?

Poe hoped that by staying at the former stormtrooper’s bedside he would find the answer. So far, his hours of patience had yielded nothing.

It wasn’t as though he didn’t see the pitying looks the doctors gave him as they passed, he just chose to give them a charming smile and hide his growing doubts. Nothing about this made sense to him. Was Finn sensitive to the force? Was Poe? No, that one he knew was definitely wrong.

So how could he sense Finn’s thoughts?

After he had waited for as long as he could stand, Poe made his way to General Organa’s office where he knew the General still stubbornly held court.

“Poe, what brings you here? You have work to do. You and your squadron should have left hours ago.” General Organa may have been small in stature and getting up there in years, but she had an uncanny ability to make him feel like he was four years old.

“I know, General Organa. I gave the order to get my squadron out of here as soon as they were ready.”

“But you did not follow?” 

Poe had been told that he had an easy charm and likable personality. All of that evaporated in front of Organa. “No, ma’am. I… I couldn’t.”

“And I have an idea why. The medical staff have told me that you’ve hardly been away from Finn’s bedside since he came back.” She had a small smile on her lips as she said this.

“Yes, I suppose that’s true. And I’m worried about him of course-”

“I’m sure the doctors have told you just as they have told me that Finn will make a full recovery.”

“Yes, they have but-”

“So why are you still here?” General Organa cut right to the heart of the matter.

“General, you… It’s said that you have… powers with the force, like your brother does.” He tried to word this very carefully. He didn’t want to upset the General or seem like he was going mad.

“Dameron?” asked General Organa, genuine concern colored her voice.

“It’s Finn, ma’am. I think he’s trying to tell me something.”

“Through the force? I’ve had no indication-”

“I can feel it, General.” The last part is tacked on after a moment’s realization that he might have spoken out of turn.

General Organa eyes him, as though she could see right into his soul. The other pilots have told him that one wrong look from General Organa, then a princess, sent an entire battalion of imperial stormtroopers running. It took a lot for Poe not to pale under it now.

“What is he trying to tell you?”

“He doesn’t want to leave.”

General Organa frowned. “We have to get off-planet as soon as possible. That’s non-negotiable. The First Order likely has squadrons on the way right now.”

“I know.”

The General stood up from behind her desk. Poe wasn’t very tall himself, but the General’s stature was always a surprise. She placed a hand on his arm, a small motherly gesture.

“I think it’s time I paid our hero a visit,” she said and headed for the door. The sudden decision took Poe by surprise and he hurried after her.

“General,” he called after her. It only took a moment for him to get caught up. “You- you believe me? Finn is trying to tell me something?”

“There’s only one way to find out. I might not have the same training as my brother, but I know something about the ways of the force. You certainly seem convinced that something strange is going on. You’re a good man, Poe. The least I can do is check it out.”

“Thank you,” said Poe, eyes bright. “Thank you.”

The General rolled her eyes. “I haven’t done anything yet, flyboy.”

The infirmary’s wide double doors flew open as they entered. Though the nursing staff was still very busy, many pairs of eyes flicked towards them to see who had entered.

“Back again, Poe? I told you this morning that I wasn’t going to let you in again. His condition is stable he’s not coming out of that coma yet.”

“I would like to see, Finn, if that’s alright Nurse Wattlet.” 

The nurse did a quick double take when she saw who had spoken. “Of course, General, but I-I was just telling Poe that Finn is not due to wake up until we reach the new base.”

“I’d like to see him anyway.” General Organa was already looking over the beds in the medical bay to find Finn.

“Right this way.” 

The nurse escorted them to Finn’s bedside. Nothing had changed since Poe had left this morning. Finn looked so peaceful in his sleep. 

“If there is anything else I can do for you, General-”

“I’m sure that won’t be necessary.”

Nurse Wattlet stuttered for a moment before realizing that she was being dismissed and hurrying away. Poe couldn’t help the small feeling of satisfaction he felt at seeing her afraid of General Organa.

The General looked over Finn’s body. On the outset, Poe had absolutely no idea what she was looking for. Something to do with the force no doubt, but what? 

“Hello, Finn. We met briefly. I never got the chance to thank you for all you’ve done for us.” The General was speaking to Finn, as though he could hear her. Finn’s dormant body gave no indication that he could.

In her examination, the General placed a hand on Finn’s chest and looked down at him, examining him slowly. Poe felt almost uncomfortable by how intimate the gesture seemed. Eventually, General Organa concluded the evaluation and turned to him.

“It is hard for me to say. I cannot be sure whether he possesses some latent force sensitivity while he is unconscious, but there is something about him. You were right to bring this to me, Poe.” She placed a hand on his arm again. “If you think he is trying to communicate something to you, it’s not likely that you’re wrong.”

She guided him to Finn’s side. “Tell me what he’s saying.”

Poe looked back at her skeptically. Finn had never spoken to Poe or anything. This was more of a feeling, one he’d cultivated over the hours spent waiting with him. “I don’t think it works like that,”

“You want to tell me how the force works?”

“No, ma’am.” Poe turned back to Finn, not sure that this would work, but afraid to question again. He took a breath and looked down at his friend. Finn’s face was calm and kind of lovely in its serenity, but all Poe wanted was for those eyes to open up again and for those lips to widen it to a full-faced grin.

“Go on, Poe.” Poe had no idea what she wanted from him. He placed his hand on Finn’s chest, in the same way as the General, and closed his eyes.

It wasn’t instant, but slowly he found that feeling again. Finn, he was sure of it. Only, Finn was upset and confused. Not sure why he couldn’t move and wasn’t awake. Not quite sure where he was. Finn, Poe tried to think towards him.

Poe couldn’t be sure how he knew that Finn had heard him. It was though he had shouted that name into the void and heard his own echoing back to him. Poe, Poe, Poe…

It was then that Poe understood what Finn was trying to say.

We can’t leave her, Poe. I can’t leave her. What if she comes looking for us? We can’t leave without Rey.

Poe opened his eyes with a shudder, as though waking suddenly from a dream. General Organa still stood over his shoulder. Watching and waiting, with those startling eyes still locked on the pair of them.

“What is he saying?”

The words took a moment to come, as though he needed to translate from feeling into thought into words.

“He doesn’t want to leave without Rey. He thinks she might come back here only to find that we’ve left. Finn doesn’t want her to be alone again.”

“None of us want that,” said General Organa, solemnly. “But you realize that now there is nothing delaying us from leaving? We must go.”

“I know.”

The General placed a hand on his shoulder. “We’ll get her back.”

Poe couldn’t be sure who she was speaking to, but he trusted her anyway.  
\---------------------------------

A contingent of stormtroopers had escorted her from the med bay to this room. It was strange to see so many of them and to not be able to run. Rey had a hard time not imagining Finn under every helmet. This was where he’d grown up. He had been exactly like these emotionless soldiers or… had he? Was there something about him his easy smile or endearing charm that had made him different all along?

Two troopers marched alongside her at each elbow. One led the way a few steps in front and she could only assume there was another behind her. They all looked the same on the outside, but slowly she saw differences. The one on her right was a few inches shorter than the other two that she could see. The trooper in front favored his right foot and walked with a slight limp. These were individual people.

Before Finn, she had never considered that stormtroopers, the blunt hammer of both the Empire and the First Order, were people beneath the white armored uniform. Perhaps because they were not supposed to be. They were a fighting force, innumerable and unstoppable, but that facade gave way when up close to them like this.

Rey suddenly had so many questions for them. What were their names? Did any of them know Finn? Where were they from? Were they kidnapped to join the First Order or did they come freely? Did they remember their families at all? 

“Where are you taking me?” is what she asked first, however.

“Quiet, prisoner.” Rey couldn’t be sure which stormtrooper had answered her, but it sounded almost like the shorter trooper on her right. 

“I have a right to know where I am going. Please just answer me,” she said, hoping the pleading in her voice would evoke a more emotional response from her guards.

“We’re-”

“Stop that! You know she’s dangerous.” The stormtrooper to her left had been about to answer when the lead stormtrooper in front with the red pauldron cut them off. 

“They said she’s some sort of Jedi but-” At this, the lead stormtrooper brought them to a halt and turned to reprimand the outspoken trooper.

“It’s not up to you to question high command. If you’ve been told she can manipulate stormtroopers then guess what? You have to treat her as though she can manipulate you.”

The voices were hard for Rey to distinguish, coming out quickly from their voice modulators.

“Yes, ma’am,” answered the trooper and with that, they carried on. 

Rey looked to her left and wondered if she was imagining the dejected look on that stormtrooper's helmet. 

It didn’t take long for Rey to grow accustomed to her cell. She had never seen so much black durasteel in her life. 

Her room wasn’t exactly a prison. Actually, it was similar to the quarters of lower ranked First Order officials, small, martial, but serviceable. The door had been locked to prevent any unauthorized exits and no one had come to let her know what was going on. She was trapped, but at least she wasn’t bound to an interrogation table like yesterday. Was it only yesterday? She couldn’t be sure. Rey let herself feel optimistic about this small improvement.

She thought she’d be able to deal with the waiting. Almost her entire life had been spent waiting for family to come back for her and there had been days where she hadn’t minded at all. 

Then again, most days hadn't been like that, full of mindless, empty waiting. Just because someone is capable of waiting doesn't make them patient. She'd busied herself with surviving at first, then with the task of making Jakku her home. In the end, she succeeded. Now there was little in the galaxy she wanted to do less than go back to the dusty desert planet, but for a while, it had become her home.

Bored, she looked around for something to scratch the durasteel walls with. On Jakku, she’d kept careful tally of how many days she had been there. It had been a pragmatic task to keep track of time or else to keep her sane. Soon, Rey realized that the search was pointless. Even if she could mar the cold, indifferent durasteel, there wasn’t so much as a clock to help her count the hours.

It was a bit like being blind or deaf. She had no sense of time, hints like the rise and set of a sun didn’t exist on a starship. There was no way to orient herself in time or space.

Perhaps this was a new torture technique. The idea was clever enough. Spend exactly zero resources on the captive and coerce them into talking at the same time. Rey wasn’t sure if she felt like confessing any deep secrets yet, but the wait was definitely beginning to wear on her.

Now that she thought about it, she wasn’t entirely sure she had any important Rebellion secrets to divulge, not that she would. Kylo Ren had tried to get her to show him the map to Luke Skywalker. That memory was still in her head, though she wasn’t sure what details an outsider could glean from what was left of it. Time had begun to clear the star systems from her memory of the map and it all seemed a bit fuzzy.

Would the First Order even care about the map? She wasn't sure why they would. Their galactic superweapon had been utterly destroyed. Shouldn’t that be their focus now?

The time stretches minutes into hours with only growing hunger as a sign that time was passing at all. She alternated pacing the room and lying on the hard bed, the only piece of furniture in the room.

Her stomach growled after a time, but she refused to pound on the door or try to signal. Surely they were aware she’d need food and it was likely another form of discomfort they wanted her to endure. She refused to give them the satisfaction.

Them. Who were they? The First Order had been such a non-entity in her life. Until she was captured and running from them, they had been almost as mythical as the Empire or the Jedi. The First Order had much of an effect on life on Jakku. She’d never been influenced by propaganda holos or experienced Order induced rationing like other worlds had. It was hard enough to survive on Jakku as it was, and it had little to offer galactic conquerors.

She had nothing to do with any of this. Or at least… she hadn’t, not before. Now she wasn’t so sure.

Somehow she had everything to do with this. Rey had used the force for kriff’s sake. What did that make her now? A Jedi?

She closed her eyes and tried to reach out the way she had twice before, in the woods and with the guards. It felt like she was stumbling around the room in the dark. She could touch the cold walls and the bed, she knew where everything was but it was… murky.

It was hard to see beyond the room through the force. Maybe she was expecting too much after using the force a grand total of three times, but after a few moments of quiet, she started to see it. A stormtrooper stood outside the door, but otherwise, this section of the ship seemed empty.

When she opened her eyes she had trouble reconciling how small her room really was, with how much of the ship she could see through the force. She clenched rough sheets in her fists to bring herself back into her own mind.

She took a few breaths, trying to lower her heart rate once more.

There was movement outside the door. Was it the guard or had she missed someone in the corridor? The door slid open and she had her answer. General Hux had come to see her in person.

She stood as he entered, not out of respect but as a fight or flight instinct. She was ready to fight. 

His hair was properly slicked back, a sign of his return to full composure. There was no sign of the desperate mess he had been on the shuttle. 

He didn’t gesture for her to sit, as though he expected that she wouldn’t, and instead surveyed the room. 

“We haven’t met yet and for that, you have my apologies.” He started. “I should have been involved in this from the start, but Kylo Ren insisted on interrogating you first. His results typically speak for themselves and this Skywalker business is entirely his operation.”

He stood before her, firmly planted, hands clasped behind his back. “With how much trouble you’ve brought with you, I knew it was time to step in. I should have been the one to interrogate you when you first arrived. I may not have the force to aid in interrogations, but I have ways of gleaning necessary information.”

Rey said nothing. He was looking at her now and she refused to look away. It felt like a childish staring contest, but one she refused to lose.

She was surprised when General Hux broke eye contact first. He pressed a panel on one of the blank durasteel walls and a shelf and chair slid out of it. He sat and pulled out a datapad she hadn’t realized he’d been holding. Rey held her ground and stood above him.

“Your name is Rey, no known surname. The first record of you appears 10 years ago when you signed a contract with Unkar Plutt to become a hired scavenger. Since then, you’ve kept a low profile, traded with other merchants at the Niima Outpost. You lived a life of subsistence, but your records show that you never resorted to crime in order to make ends meet. You were absolutely no one.”

The General looked up at her for a reaction but received none. Standing in front of him began to feel like she was awaiting a sentencing, but she didn’t dare sit or turn her back to Hux.

How did he know any of this anyway? Jakku was nowhere and everyone on the planet was a castoff from somewhere else in the galaxy. The invasion had been one thing, the First Order had been after intelligence, but spying on the dealings of a seedy merchant? It seemed unlikely.

“The influence of the First Order extends farther than most dare dream. Even General Organa herself can’t possibly know its limits. Our allies are as countless as the stars. Your friend Unkar Plutt had a habit of selling his wares to a friend off-world, who in turn sold them to Kanjiklub, who kept a very close eye on all sides of the operation.” His eyes glinted when he spoke of the First Order’s magnitude and his voice rose almost like an echo of one of his speeches. 

He cleared his throat and continued enumerating the events of the last few days. “You weren’t involved in the attack on Jakku, as you lived on the opposite side of the planet, but a mere two days later you encountered the traitor FN-2187 and an astromech droid. The two of you and the droid stole a freighter known as the Millennium Falcon and escaped the planet.”

He recounted some of the other details of the last few days. The words felt less like they had happened to her and more like a story being told to her. She couldn’t predict how it would end just yet.

“As of yesterday’s interrogation and subsequent escape, you exhibited high levels of force sensitivity.” He paused, seemingly finished regaling her of her recent escapades. It was all disturbingly accurate.

“I have some questions for you when you are ready to answer them.” 

Rey honestly hadn’t expected to be given a choice. She opened her mouth to say something but was interrupted.

“Not now, of course.” Of course? She expected to be starved, tortured until she talked. “I’ll have plenty of time to get to know you later. We expect to reach our destination in fifteen days. I’ll have all I need to know in five. Answer questions and behave yourself for the remainder of our time together and I see no reason why past mistakes should impact your time here. Obedience is expected but shall be rewarded.”

Obedience. He saw her as an animal. A dog in a cage. In time, would want her to become his personal hound like Kylo Ren? Was it possible that it was not love or affection she had witnessed on the shuttle, but a cold sort of mourning for the loss of a strategic advantage? He saw Kylo Ren as a beast, a slave to base instinct and immune to logic and reason. Rey felt sick.

“Until further notice, you are to remain here, locked in and under supervision. We wouldn’t want you to try an escape again, would we?” Rey’s eyes narrowed.

“You’ll take meals in here and be let out to use the bathing facilities twice a day. Show compliance and I will extend your privileges to include recreation. Understood?”

It was the first time she’d been able to speak since he’d entered. Perhaps he simply loved the sound of his own voice.

“Yes.” she answered and delighted in her own self-control, not letting the ‘sir’ that felt customary slip out at the end. That sort of deference might be expected from officers or stormtroopers, but she was not about to concede an inch to his authority.

If the lack of moniker rankled the General, he did not show it. On the contrary, he smiled a small chilling smile. “A pleasure, Rey. We’ll meet again very soon. Perhaps I’ll soon learn why Kylo Ren was so impressed with you. Good night.”

She could have dissected every detail of the meeting in her mind. It was whirring with adrenaline and worked to process everything that she had just been told. Somehow the only piece that stuck out to her was the end: good night. There was no way for her to have any sense of time. Was it night? Should she sleep? Her mind had already made the decision and she slumped over the mess of itchy sheets covering her bed and fell asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A second chapter? A second chapter! I told you I had most of this typed up already so here's some more!
> 
> If you've made it this far I am eternally grateful. Feel free to ask me things in the comment section or on tumblr @keep-on-leggin


	3. Chapter 3

Morning arrived and Phasma set about preparing for the first day of a new normal. It started out the same as her days always did with bright lights, getting dressed in uniform minus her usual silver armor which was being repaired, and taking her morning meal in the mess hall before heading to morning debriefing. 

Most things aboard the Finalizer seemed to have settled to normal levels of urgency, but there was an even darker, solemn mood about the crew than usual. They were in a very serious business, of war and its consequences, but even loss on this scale was something no one had ever imagined.

Phasma hadn't imagined that she was one of maybe a hundred people who had survived the collapse of Starkiller Base. It was a planet as well as a military weapon and over a million people populated as well as served on the planet. The base had been tremendous and now there was a gaping void in the First Order’s operations.

She had lost many of her troops, nearly all of them when she looked a little deeper into things. There was a sense of loss, but not quite that of a mother losing children or even that of losing a family member, but of learning that someone you worked with had a death in the family. The large scale of loss buried all emotion beneath a dull roar.

It was no surprise to her when she sat down in a silent but mostly filled conference table. There were three empty chairs, one that would remain so, one waiting to be filled by the General, and one for the incapacitated Kylo Ren. Every face was frozen and downcast and eyes refused to meet across the table. 

General Hux entered after everyone was in attendance. All eyes were trained on him as he marched to the head of the table and stood for a moment behind his seat. His movements spoke of hours of contemplation coming to fruition. He took his seat before them.

At first, he took great care to speak solely in technical terms. Topics ranged from new supply quantities, active troop deployments, and timelines for the repairs needed for the ship’s hyperdrive. Phasma fidgeted slightly in her seat, hating that they seemed to be avoiding the largest issue at hand.

She felt the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding release when Hux’s speech began to slow to a stop. He looked at each face sitting at the table. His stoic countenance refused to break.

“We experienced a loss greater than any the galaxy has ever known. In history, we can look back to the destruction of Alderaan for comparable numbers. We look at the destruction of Hosnian Prime for losses of even greater size. In truth, there is no comparison to be made for loss of human life. Our compatriots on Starkiller Base died.” Someone at the table flinched violently at the bluntness of the word.

“They died working to achieve the dream we all share, and we shall remember them by fighting to make it a reality. I am aware of our setbacks and we will have plenty of time to discuss them and set them aright. Today, I give you a rare reprieve. Mourn the dead, mourn the loss of our great weapon. Tomorrow, we shall begin anew and build on the tremendous progress we started in the annihilation of Hosnian Prime. All is not lost, sirs, I know that we are exactly where we are meant to be.” 

He stood tall and proud at the end of the table and some officers stood to applaud him. Phasma was not moved. She had far too much experience with his pomp and with him as an actual person to be swept away by such a speech. It satisfied her need to be reassured though. It was an attempt to make things alright again.

Things weren’t alright, not yet, but they would be. It was almost an order from Hux: take time, but come back stronger and ready to win. She could do that.

“You have your assignments, as of today we shall attempt to return to a sense of normalcy. Tomorrow, we reconvene and get to work.” He took a long breath. “There is so much work to be done. Dismissed.”

The other officers filed out of the room, but Phasma felt it was her duty to linger for a moment. “General,” she began, but soon corrected. “Hux.”

“What is it Phasma?” he nearly sighed. The General was closing programs, simulations, and spreadsheets that hovered in holograms throughout the room. 

“It’s true you know, what you said every bit of it.”

“I wouldn’t have said it if it wasn’t true.”

Phasma stopped herself from rolling her eyes. “We have suffered major losses and it’s important for us to move on.”

“I listen to myself speak just as well as you do.” His expression was as close to a smile as it was likely to get for a while.

“And I agree with you,” she said. “But it’s also important to let yourself feel things.”

Hux stopped what he was doing to look at her. He folded his arms across his chest. “And here I thought you had actually listened to me. I told them to do just that.”

“If you don’t mind my saying so, sir,” she paused. “It was good advice for you as well.”

The General’s lips curved genuinely into a sad smile. “Dismissed, Captain.”

Captain Phasma refused to be emotional about the current state of affairs. In her line of work, there was still an all too real threat of being considered too emotional or feminine to show the slightest bit of compassion. Time had shown her well what a woman had to be in order to lead. Hux didn’t have that worry. Even the slight cracks in his perfect composure would be seen as compassionate and responsive rather than hysterical. 

That was all she could think about as she went to inspect her new batch of stormtroopers following the morning’s meeting. A woman in power wasn’t allowed to be a leader, she was a stormtrooper with shiny armor.  
\-----------------------------------  
Rey didn’t sleep at all in that room. It was too dark and too cold. Above all she was scared. She had no idea what was going to happen to her.

Well, she had some idea but nothing to help assuage her for the long term. Would her life even last long enough to extend into a long term? The prospects didn’t seem great.

She took stock of the things she knew for certain and tried to make a list.

She was going to be here for a while, 15 days at least.  
She was a prisoner, but they seemed keen on giving her some basic human dignities.  
General Hux was going to come back and ask her questions, likely for the next five days.

This last piece of information seemed the most pressing. He said the interrogation would last five days and he also seemed like the type to place a high value on efficiency. This meant he’d be coming soon. Soon, in her current vague conception of time, was anywhere from minutes from now to endless hours. It was one of the reasons she found it impossible to sleep.

The sudden sound of her door opening and light filled her room and startled her more than she would want to admit. Two stormtroopers in full uniform came and escorted her to the bathing facilities. Rey was just grateful to no longer be confined to that room.

The troopers kept their distance and a tight grip on their blasters. Perhaps they had heard rumors about what she was capable of and wanted to protect themselves any way they could. Maybe they believed all force users were as unstable as Kylo Ren. She did her best to smile at them in silent gratitude whenever she caught their eye… or eyehole at least.

When she came back to her room it was as spotless as it had been the day before. There was no sign of her attempts at sleep or even rumpled sheets from where she sat panicking all night long. On the bed was a new set of clothes identical to the plain garb she was wearing and a small note on flimsi that said only “five minutes”.

There was no way to predict exactly what that note meant, but Rey thought she had a pretty good idea. She also had no way of knowing when those five minutes were up, so it seemed more like an assholish thing to do than an actual courtesy towards her. 

When the door slid open again, she was fully dressed and waiting. General Hux strolled in, unchanged from the day before. He carried a tray which held his datapad, a container of water, and something wrapped in plastic packaging.

“Good morning,” He said, to which Rey did not respond. It did not faze him in the slightest. “I’ve brought you breakfast,” He gestured to the water and supposed foodstuff.

Rey took the offered meal and looked at it warily before breaking the seal on the package. 

“I’m told it takes a while to get used to the stuff, though I really wouldn’t know.”

“Generals don’t have to eat the same food they feed the soldiers?” asked Rey, thinking that Leia would never stand for such corruption.

“No, I’ve never really had much else. I grew up on it really, even the prototype versions. It’s not meant for anything but nutrition, but it’s far closer to actual food than the Empire ever came…”

Few people thought back in the Empire with fondness or romantic feelings. Hux seemed strangely proud that they were surpassing their predecessors even on this small level. 

She took a hesitant bite of the ration bar and considered it for a moment. On Jakku, she’d been used to instant meals that you needed to add water to or heat a bit. The food-brick’s texture was not entirely off-putting, but its complete lack of flavor made her want to spit it out. She swallowed and wasn’t entirely unsatisfied.

“Now, we’ll begin questioning today and this shall be the general routine for the next five days or for however long I see fit. Ready to begin?” He was primly perched on the same chair as yesterday, facing her and awaiting some signal that she might actually answer some of his questions. Rey gave him no such sign but stared at him skeptically over her breakfast.

“We proved yesterday that you are in fact able to talk, so we’ll build on that forward momentum, shall we? Now, you weren’t born on Jakku, is that correct?”

Rey was surprised by his line of questioning and that he wasn’t angling for Resistance secrets right from the start. Though, she supposed there would be plenty of time in her near future to get to that.

“That's correct.”

“And there is no record of your parentage or your home planet, care to fill in some of the gaps in our records?”

“I don’t know. Any of that.” She said, trying to seem sincere, which she was, but she couldn't be sure if General Hux would believe her. She really wanted a drink of the water he'd brought, but she couldn't force herself to move. It felt like undergoing surgery without anesthetic, staying as still as possible to avoid a slip of the knife.

“Fine.” Hux tapped his datapad a few times. “Now, you exhibited few visible signs of force sensitivity until recently, when did those abilities first manifest themselves?”

“I don’t know,” Rey added no qualifier to the statement. She had absolutely no knowledge about the force. If she had it, she must have always had it because she had never known any different.

“Do you plan on answering questions today, Rey?” He looked at her with an arched brow.

“If you ask questions I know the answers to. I’ll answer to the best of my ability.” She smiled with a bit of bite mixed in.

“Try a little harder on the next few. Few beings on Jakku claim to have any connection with you, most weren’t even aware of your name. Did you form any relationships in the fifteen years you lived on the planet?”

Rey took that sip of water she wanted, emotion seemed to be enough to break her spell of paralysis. “No,” she said. “I didn't have friends. I did work and I got paid.”

“For fifteen years? That’s a long time to live alone.”

“I know all about waiting,” intoned Rey.

“And what were you waiting for? You say you have no memory or knowledge of your parents and you don’t know where you came from other than the fact that it wasn’t Jakku.”

“I…” She was startled by his questioning suddenly shifting into a higher gear. 

“Don’t say you don’t know. I’ll accept silence before I hear those words come out of your mouth again. Why did you wait on Jakku? You are apparently gifted. Why were you wasting your life away?”

His interrogation tactic was very different from that of Kylo Ren. The force user compelled information he knew the victim had and was hiding from him. It had been easy to resist him because it was only a matter of will. Hux started with broad questions to test out her soft spots, teasing them before digging in with sharp claws.

She wasn’t about to get caught up in it.

“I was scared and orphaned. I just needed to survive. Maybe the force helped me survive, but I never felt safe enough to leave. I fought so long for what little I had. It was nearly impossible to even think about pursuing something different.” It was close enough to the truth that it didn't feel like lying through her teeth.

“And yet that life never would have resulted in you sitting before me.” He slowed his pace and re-evaluated the tack of his questioning.“When did you become involved with the Resistance?”

She thought that she had misheard him. “What?”

“Now, there is no record of Resistance activity on Jakku… a couple of vigilante thefts from gang members, am I right in assuming that was you?”

She said nothing and knew immediately that Hux understood it to be guilt.

“Right. Now, how did they contact you?”

“How do you know that I didn’t contact them?” 

He looked up with a small crocodile smile. “What you’ve just said indicates that you would do nothing of the sort.”

Actually, she kind of had. “Fine.” She decided she would test just how good an interrogator Hux really was. “They found out about me through some of the work I was doing on Jakku. I would have been on the next ship off world with Poe Dameron, but as you know, that didn’t go according to plan.”

Hux was watching her intently. “It seems that nothing did go to plan that day or many of the days following.”

“So I improvised and BB-8 found me and I ran into Finn.” She hoped it was true that the best lies were built on truth.

“How clever,” He said in far too patronizing a tone. She stopped speaking altogether. 

“I think we’re done for today,” said General Hux, standing and straightening his uniform jacket. 

Rey’s mouth was practically agape, but she said nothing.

“It was going so well for a moment there, but this is going nowhere if you’re not going to be honest with me.” He took the empty tray and glass. “It was a good try though, really.”

The door opened and he handed the two items to an awaiting stormtrooper.

“This was interesting, Rey. We’ll meet again in the morning. I hope you’ll have learned not to lie to me by then. This will all go so much more smoothly.”

When he left, Rey wondered how long she’d been speaking to him. It felt like ages, but the full feeling in her stomach told her it had been twenty minutes at the most. 

He hadn’t pried her for information about the Resistance. That was coming, she knew. His insistence on questioning her past had been unexpected and had almost gotten a straight answer out of her. 

She wasn’t sure how the basic strategy she'd adhered to would hold up under further questioning. For this first meeting, she had tried to avoid answering in too much detail and giving him too much information about who she was. She had the feeling that if he could get into her mindset all was lost. It was frightening, just like it had been when Kylo Ren had tried to invade her mind. She wondered if Hux would be emperor of the galaxy by now if he had Kylo Ren’s force sensitivity.

With hours stretching out before her now, she looked around the room for something to do. Something had to come to her eventually, didn’t it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading and giving kudos! It's nice to know I'm not alone out here. 
> 
> Side note: omg, you probably saw the trailer, right? I don't have enough words. I'm so excited.


	4. Chapter 4

Rey hardly looked up when her door opened again. 

“Are you ready to try this again?” 

A day had passed. She could tell because, like clockwork, everything that had happened the previous day had happened again. Including the shower, which Rey really didn’t think was necessary. Though yesterday’s had been with water, more than she’d seen in her her whole life at one time, clean and warm and wet, and today’s was a sonic shower. She didn’t like it as much.

General Hux had returned right on schedule, looking just as he had the day before and the day before that. His appearance was completely regulation standard aside from his bright shock of red hair. Rey had never seen someone with red hair before. 

“We can try,” she answered, much in the same spirit as the day before. Rey was not going to tell him anything, but she could humor the General. Maybe she could get on his good side if there was such a thing.

“Excellent.” 

Rey chewed her nutrient bar and Hux set his datapad up to record notes from the interrogation. She noticed that he was waiting for her to finish before starting. Today, she decided to see how long she could stretch this. 

“This would be much less awkward if you could do something other than stare at me.”

Hux raised an eyebrow. “While I’m not about to take orders from a prisoner, I suppose I could bring some caf tomorrow to avoid ‘staring at you’. It’s nothing personal. Are you ready?”

“As I’ll ever be.”

“Right, now we left off yesterday with the how you became involved in the Resistance,” He marched onward into the business at hand with little prelude. “You gave me some story that we both know to be false. I understand why; you were attempting to withhold information about the Resistance from us. You did a good job trying to cover it up, I must say. Perhaps you would have fooled a lesser officer.”

Rey would have rolled her eyes if he was not looking right at her.

“I was trying to allow you to open up on your own, to gauge your level of compliance. I think I understand you quite well after that. Yesterday, I did not tell you all we know about the Resistance and how you came to them, I wanted you to fill in the blanks.”

Rey shifted on the bed and felt Hux’s eyes on her the moment it made a sound. 

“I don’t particularly care how you came into contact with them. Perhaps you didn’t know a thing about them until you came into contact with that droid. Either way, you escaped Jakku and soon found yourself on a smuggling vessel, captained by one Han Solo. Did you know who he was at the time?”

She couldn’t see his motivation behind asking the question. Her mind was mostly preoccupied with the vision in her mind’s eye of Han Solo smiling at her on Takodana and then, later, as he fell lifeless from the catwalk on Starkiller Base. “He introduced himself soon enough. He didn’t want any part of the Resistance so he took us to Takodana.”

“That’s a tremendous change of heart. He died on Starkiller.”

“Kylo Ren killed him.”

There seemed to be a small smile on the General’s face. It turned her blood cold. 

“Yes, he did.” He changed topic abruptly. “Kylo Ren took you captive on Takodana.”

“Yes.”

“So you have never been to the Resistance base?”

“I…” No, no she hadn’t. She had never been to the Resistance base. Never met anyone from the Resistance, just an old smuggler, a free-wheeling BB unit, and possibly the kindest person she had ever met, who had lied to her about being involved in the Resistance. Why should she expect anyone to come and rescue her?

“So the extent of your knowledge about the Resistance is that they once had a base in the Ileenium system, a base they are vacating even as we speak.”

Rey said nothing. Only now did she look away from Hux, instead examining the fabric of her blankets.

“Rey, believe it or not, this is very good news for you. You have nothing to hide.”

She thought of being shackled to an interrogation table only days ago. 

“Kylo Ren is no longer after the map. The Supreme Leader has ordered him to stop searching for Luke Skywalker and I have forbidden him from trying to ‘take’ it from you again.”

The thought relieved her, but she was still suspicious. “Then why am I still here?”

General Hux laughed at that. “You can’t really be as naive as that. Surely you understand that you have a much larger role to play in the future of the galaxy than anyone can truly know.” 

“Says who? Kylo Ren? Snoke? I don’t want any part of this.”

“It’s a little too late for that.” He almost looked sympathetic. It was as though he had done a very good job at teaching his facial muscles how to feign emotion. “We are taking you to Snoke and soon after, you will learn your place in all of this.”

I don’t want a place in all of this, thought Rey, unless it’s in bringing you down.

“I don’t see any reason to continue these sessions. I think I have everything we need, don’t you?” 

He didn’t wait for an answer. 

“Good. Very good.” The General stood and straightened his uniform. To Rey’s eyes, this seemed entirely unnecessary. “We will see about getting you some privileges on board. Perhaps, starting with recreation. We are a military vessel so there is not much on board, but I’m sure proper arrangements can be made to make you more comfortable. All accommodations will be made under the condition that you will not cause any trouble while you are with us, is that understood?”

Rey felt whiplash from the sudden, brisk change in demeanor. “Yes?” It came out like a question, but the General did not seem to care. 

“We should reach the Supreme Leader in approximately eight days, with one stop for resupply along the way. I’ll send someone to show you around later. Do try and stay out of the way of day to day operations. Otherwise, I’m sure we’ll have no trouble at all.”

She wasn’t sure what he wanted her to say in response. The General turned on his heel and left without another word. Rey was left gaping, speechless in the dark.

Rey was left like that for a few hours. She wasn’t sure whether to be angry with herself, perhaps it really was inevitable that they would find out that she really wasn’t all that important anyway. More than anything, she found herself confused and wishing she was far, far away from this ship and that General. 

\-------------------------  
A group of five stormtroopers below her ran one of the General’s simulations. Phasma wasn’t convinced that the simulations were the best training method for new soldiers, but they had their uses. 

A soldier down below was hidden behind a bluff, waiting to snipe an adversary. A simulated opponent made its way behind the bluff, the hidden trooper completely unaware. He was focused on a singular goal, that was the problem with simulations, games. 

Games are meant to be won, and ultimately there is only one way to do that. Most of her soldiers, having been raised on these exercises think that you must take out your opponent in order to win, but an important part of winning is making sure you, yourself, stay alive. They have no idea what it is like to fight for their lives, none at all.

She was about to end the simulation when General Hux came to stand beside her on the catwalk. He might as well see this, though they’ve had this argument many times before. 

“General,” Phasma greeted him. She was surprised to see him here, when there were so many other things that likely required his attention now, but did not let it show. 

“Captain, I trust the training is back on schedule.”

“As though I never left.” That was about the only thing that had gone uninterrupted by the destruction of Starkiller. Though they had lost many stormtroopers on the base, the rest remained in fine shape. 

“Good, I have need of you for a different sort of assignment.” He paused to let her set up the next group for the simulation. “The prisoner taken from Starkiller, do you recall our previous conversation regarding her?”

Phasma should have known that Hux wouldn’t have hinted at her possible future involvement if he didn’t already have a plan. The time had come now to see it to fruition.

“What did you have in mind?”  
\-----------------------------  
“I’ve been asked to train with you,” said Captain Phasma without greeting. She entered the room and stood waiting. 

Rey hadn’t expected this at all. After days of being locked up, answering the General’s questions, and staring holes into the walls, this was her reward?

She looked at the black clothing that had been delivered to her room that morning. It was a material unlike any she had ever felt, let alone worn. Not even the clothes she’d worn for the last few days compared to its strange texture. Phasma was wearing something similar, a black tunic that left her arms bare and elastic pants that clung to her legs like a second skin. 

It took Rey a moment to realize that Phasma was waiting for her to hurry up and get changed. 

“In the future, you will be dressed when I arrive to escort you.” said the blonde as Rey pulled the shirt over her head.

“The small one goes first,” said Phasma. With a quick glance, Rey saw that the woman was not looking at her like an idiot for not what do with these new clothes. Phasma gestured to a garment on top of her pile of new clothes. It looked like a cropped version of Phasma’s shirt, but tighter and with a slight stretch to it. “It goes underneath everything.”

Once completely dressed, Rey realized it functioned the same way her bindings had and made all levels of function a bit more comfortable. Phasma remained expressionless for the most part, as blank as the mask she usually wore. She wondered how many people got to see this face.

Phasma didn’t wear her armor as they left her cell and headed to the training room. Few people gave them a second glance. It was possible the chrome armor was more conspicuous than the person underneath.

It felt better than it should have to see the corridor outside her room. The interior of the Finalizer looked virtually the same no matter where you went, whether you were trapped in a room the entire time or had free reign of the ship the view didn’t change.

If pressed to remember the route they took to the training center, Rey wasn’t entirely sure she could. She knew that the ship she stood on could hold an entire city and it felt like they had walked for blocks before the reached a door with an access panel Phasma turned green.

Inside were machines that looked vaguely like the table she’d woken up strapped to when she’d first been captured by the Order. The room was entirely empty for them. Phasma stood just behind Rey’s shoulder, waiting for her to enter, but she had no idea what to do. This was supposed to be recreation?

Phasma sighed and moved past her. Rey followed slowly.

The other woman began to stretch different muscles, her arms, neck, legs, and back in turn. Rey tried to follow suit. 

“So I see you’ve never seen a gym before?” said Phasma as she made her way through the stretches. There was clearly an order to them that she’d practiced many times.

“You don’t find many places like this on Jakku.” 

Phasma smiled a little. “No, I suppose you wouldn’t.”

When they finished, Phasma walked them over to one of the machines. “This is a military facility and as such, there is no real form of recreation available in the typical sense, especially not available to high-security prisoners like yourself. This is the best option available at present and I’ve consented to let you join me in training for the next few nights. We’ll go through the regimen I have planned and you can modify it as you wish. Understood?”

She noticed Phasma’s voice take on the quality of drill sergeant. It had been an instant transition like flipping a switch to activate a vocoder and suddenly all human quality to it had vanished.

“I understand,” she answered.

“Good.” Phasma moved to touch a panel on the nearest wall. “This is the schedule for tonight. Let me know if you have questions.”

Naturally, Rey had many questions. She had never been in a training facility let alone been raised in one like almost everyone on the ship. Phasma didn’t seem to mind much though. The Captain proved to be an excellent teacher which she supposed made sense for someone used to explaining battle strategy and military exercises.

Soon enough, both women were on machines and panting with exertion. Neither of them spoke unless necessary. Rey thought she would have found it hard to squeeze any conversation between breaths. 

While lifting weights and feeling a light burn in her arms was a decent distraction, Rey couldn’t stop watching Phasma when she thought she wouldn’t be noticed. The woman was a goddess, strong, powerful and tall. The muscles in her arms shone with a light veil of sweat as she lifted the machine’s handles over her head, benching twice what Rey thought she herself would be able to, not that she thought herself weak.

In fact, she felt a slight tinge of pride at being able to keep up with Phasma as well as she did. They finished the planned circuit in about an hour before toweling off and getting water.

“Not bad for your first time. Are you sure you didn’t use the force to help?”

Rey hadn’t known that anyone besides Kylo Ren and the General were aware that she had any sort of abilities. Phasma was sort of high ranking though, it would make sense for her to be aware of that, right?

“I don’t think I would know it if I did.” She said, mostly to herself. 

“That will be all for tonight. I’ll show you where the showers are.”

Off of the training facilities were public showers with shoulder high dividing walls. Rey had learned to eschew her modesty early in life, but she thought that being able to look strangers in the eye while showering was a little too discomforting. 

Phasma had no qualms about stripping out her sweaty workout gear and embracing the scorching heat of the sanistream. Once again, Rey followed her lead.

The showers were supplied with towels and replacement lounge clothes as Phasma referred to them, uniform black shirts and pants that composed a casual off-duty uniform. Rey thought the First Order was trying a little too hard with their all-black aesthetic.

Upon arriving back to Rey’s room, Phasma stopped to stand inside for a moment. “You will be sore in the morning. The hot shower will help, but stretching is better. Do you remember what I showed you before?”

“Not all of it.” Rey admitted. “but-” She had been about to tell her that she’d be fine when Phasma walked over and sat down next to her on the bed.

“Show me what you remember,” she said, gentle but not a question. 

Phasma guided her once more through the stretches. This time, she placed a hand here or there to deepen the stretch or to show her where she should feel it. Rey couldn’t help but lean into the touch of someone who didn’t mean to hurt her.

Rey awoke in the morning with a comfortable ache in her muscles. Her abdominal muscles were tight and she felt them in every move she made. She lifted her arms experimentally and found that they too were sore. After stretching last night, she wondered if she would have been in pain if not for Phasma’s assistance.

Without thinking, she crossed her arm across her chest and held it in a long stretch. In her subconscious, two arms reached around her and deepened the stretch. The hands were warm and strong against her skin. Rey opened her eyes quickly, ending the sensation instantly. She almost looked around to see if someone was there before realizing the idea was silly.

She followed the routine Phasma taught her as closely as she could remember it, all the while remembering Phasma’s hands guiding her through the steps. There was a firm hand on her back, fingers guiding her foot into place, warm breath on her neck as she leaned in close…

Her cheeks were warm by the time she finished. She would have been embarrassed had there been anyone else to see. It felt strange to long for someone’s presence so deeply and not really know anything about them. She blamed it on her isolation and tried not to linger on the thought.

The ship was still a bit too cold on her skin, a degree or two too low for her to feel completely comfortable. The clothes provided to her were warmer than what she was used to wearing, but part of her missed the radiant heat of Jakku’s sun and the warmth of the sand. 

In fact, she wished to be anywhere but here. Such was the nature of being a captive, she thought. There had to be a way to escape. There had to. Poe Dameron had done it, and the thought gave her hope. Then, she remembered that Finn had helped him secure a ship and fight off the pursuing ships. She tried not to dwell on that part.

Rey focused on the assets she had to help aid in her escape. She was a damn good pilot. Perhaps not as good as Poe Dameron, but this wasn’t really a contest. She drew a blank after that one and had a hard time thinking of another.

She avoided thinking of all the challenges she faced in trying to leave, but over time they came all at once.

There was no way she could escape her room without being caught by the guard outside. There was no way she could open the door on her own. Even if she could make it out of her room, she would probably get caught on her way to the hangar. If she could get to the hangar, she wouldn’t be able to get close enough to a ship to power it up. If she could get into a TIE fighter and pilot it, she would be shot down within minutes. 

All these scenarios started increasing her heart rate and her breathing quickened until she was panting. The cell suddenly felt too small and too dark and too cold and she needed to get out. She slammed her fist against one of the cold durasteel walls. The pain of it forced her out of the episode until she sat shuddering on the floor. Tears streamed down her face, but she at least she was starting to calm now. 

She forced her eyes closed and slowed her breathing. Meditation washed over her as the tears dried on her cheeks. The shape of the room began to form in her mind ad she was comforted by the familiarity of it. In her mind, she was able to open the door to her room and look down the hall. 

A stormtrooper stood, leaning against the door to her room. Otherwise, the corridor was deserted. She almost pitied the soldier and how bored he must have been guarding a door that was never going to open of its own accord. The stormtrooper looked oddly human in a position other than at attention. 

Someone passed by at the end of the hall walking perpendicular to their hallway and the trooper straightened quickly before returning to the way he was before. 

Rey didn’t stay with the trooper for long. In her mind, she ran down the hallway and made her way through the Finalizer. The ship was the size of several cities and it was easy to get lost. She knew she wanted to find the hangar, as though she was making her escape, and slowly she found her way. It didn’t feel like she was being pulled in any specific direction, but when she came to a crossroads and thought about the decision she needed to make, the choice seemed so clear. 

In time, she found the hangar, swarming with troop regiments, technicians, pilots, and officers. She didn’t see the vivid red hair of General Hux but spotted the platinum blonde shine of Captain Phasma almost a foot taller than everyone around her. She stood before ranks of stormtroopers and spoke to them in a booming voice Rey could only hear echoes of. Then she walked down the ranks, inspecting each troop, and calling out certain individuals one by one.

Rey tried not to stay too long even though she knew no one could see her. Occasionally she thought she saw a trooper stare too long in her direction but hoped that was just paranoia. 

She walked towards one of the chained TIE fighters. It felt so real, as though she could hop in and take off right now, leaving this awful place far behind. She knew it was impossible and she turned away from it quickly. 

The walk back to her meditating body seemed to faster than the walk to leave it. Soon enough she was back outside of her room, not entirely sure she wanted to go back in. She had freed herself from the cell, at least in spirit, and she had no desire to go back to being imprisoned.

The stormtrooper outside of her room had their head down and Rey knew that he was sleeping under the helmet. She wondered how he could stand up while being fast asleep and thought that he had either had plenty of time to practice or was naturally gifted. 

She realized that this walking around was not real freedom from her current situation. It felt real enough, but it was never going to achieve the results she desired. Her spiritual escapade had taught her something important, though. If she wanted to escape the Finalizer, she would need one of two things: help from someone or more skill in the force.

The force had helped her escape briefly before. She had manipulated that guard and had moved around Starkiller Base without anyone catching her. If she could learn how to use it, she might not need anyone to help her. 

But would she be able to teach herself in two weeks? It was impossible to say.

She opened her eyes and surveyed her surroundings. An emptiness in her stomach told her that an hour or so had passed in her mental absence. Surely someone would be coming soon with a fresh ration bar. Rey couldn’t believe her body was accepting those as food.

It would be a few minutes before it arrived so she decided to try something before she was completely distracted by food. She closed her eyes once more and looked out into the outside corridor once more. The stormtrooper was still there but had lifted their helmet signaling that they were awake. 

Rey concentrated on what the trooper’s face looked beneath the helmet. With some concentration, she could see a round nose and thick eyebrows beneath a man’s bald head. She focused on his eyes and thought of one very simple action.

She was pulled back to her body by the sound of the door to her room sliding open. Rey’s eyes were wide in shock. She did it.

With a breath to calm her fast beating heart, she knew she needed to close the door before her mid-day meal arrived.

“You will close the door,” she said with the same monotone, controlled voice that had worked wonders for her in the past.

The stormtrooper didn’t move.

Rey started to panic. If someone found out that she could open the door, she might not be allowed to see the outside of her room ever again.

The trooper was still dazed from being compelled to open the door. Rey suppressed all of her emotions; the glee of using the force successfully, her fear of being caught. With a slow voice, tapping into the light she was becoming intimately familiar with, she repeated her command.

It worked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading, giving kudos, bookmarking, and commenting! It really means everything to me!


	5. Chapter 5

The new base was not altogether dissimilar from their old base. The planet was a bit more humid and had jungles that stretched far beyond the runways and crept in between the barracks, but the setup of the resistance base was ultimately the same as the one before it. While it had been strange and unfamiliar at first, Poe found that it almost reminded him of Yavin 4. 

It wasn’t too difficult to keep from feeling homesick, though. There was always something to be done in the early days of setting up a base. Poe was just a pilot, but there was always someone who needed something moved or taken to a specific person, and Poe was always ready to help.

He didn’t go to see Finn as often as he had on the previous base, there was just too much to be done, but he made sure he was the first person to see him when he woke up.

Nurse Wattlet sent Poe a direct com an hour before she planned to take Finn out of stasis. It had been the only way she had been able to get him to leave in the first place. Poe arrived as soon as he could and watched as Finn’s eyes flickered open. 

He was calm at first, his eyes slowly taking in his new surroundings. It took a moment for everything that had happened to come rushing back to him.

Finn sat up quickly and looked around. His vital signs spiked on the monitors as his heart raced. Poe and Nurse Wattlet raced over to his sides.

“Finn... Finn!” Poe said, trying to calm him down. “It’s alright buddy, calm down.”

Finn didn’t respond to his name immediately but looked over to see who was talking to him. There was a second of recognition before he eased almost instantly. 

“Poe, Poe Dameron…” He looked as though he didn’t fully believe it. “You made it. Why… how did you get out of Starkiller alive?”

With a smile, Poe relaxed too. He had tried very hard not to let his stress worry show, but he cared about Finn and was so glad that he was okay. “I could ask you the same question, buddy. In fact, you probably have a way better story to tell.”

He was trying to put Finn at ease, making light of everything that they had just survived, but he could watch on Finn’s face as he searched through his memories of the last few days. Poe knew the questions that were coming.

“Rey… where is Rey? Is she here too? Where are we anyway?”

That question that had emanated from him in his sleep. The feelings of loss and betrayal that had been so strong that Poe had felt them too were back. 

“Finn, we don’t know where she is. She didn’t come back with you.”

Finn looked as though he didn’t believe what he was hearing. “Well, we have to go back for her then. She’s counting on us. She-”

“-Finn, there… there’s a chance she didn’t make it.”

“She didn’t die. There’s no way she’s dead. Look, we have to go get her.”

This hurt Poe more than he ever thought that it would. “Finn, even if she is alive, we have no idea where to find her. Starkiller base was destroyed, the entire planet is gone.”

“And Rey is just one person. She’s not worth finding,” said Finn, a dark look on his face.

“I didn’t say that.” 

Nurse Wattlet took that moment to step in. “Son, you have been under a great deal of stress and trauma in the last few days. It is imperative that you rest now in order to get better.”

Finn didn’t balk under her commanding tone of voice. “All I’ve done for days is rest. I can’t stay in here another minute knowing that Rey is out there suffering because of me.” 

There was a moment of silence. Poe looked at the man in front of him in complete shock. “What? Are you crazy?”

“I’m the one who dragged her into this mess, I’m responsible for her.”

“And who’s responsible for you? No one’s blaming anyone, but if you follow that kind of logic, then this is all my fault,” It was clear he had never thought of it that way. “We just have to live with the consequences.”

Finn shook his head. “We need to get her back.”

Nurse Wattlet tutted the two of them as she busied herself around their tense conversation. It appeared that neither of them was going to pay her any mind, and her patient was likely to run off at any minute, so she might as well make sure he was in a fit enough state to do so.

Poe worried his lip. “Finn is this- do you think that Rey is alive…” He wanted to make sure he said this right. “Because you have the force?”

“Now who sounds crazy?” asked Finn, half-amused but not sure what to make of Poe’s question.

“It’s just that, while you were unconscious you… spoke to me. Through the force.”

Finn’s laugh surprised him. “That’s ridiculous. I can’t… I’m about as force sensitive as a brick. What are you talking about?”

Nurse Wattlet yanked a couple of sensors off of Finn’s skin with a vicious tug. “There,” she said. “You’re free to go.”

Poe looked up at Finn. “I think there’s someone you need to talk to.”

General Organa wasn’t too hard to find. With everything that needed to be set in order after moving to a new base, she was unhappily held captive in her office by paperwork. She was dwarfed by her desk and the three droids with datapads for her to sign off on. Finn and Poe were an almost welcome intrusion.

She shooed the droids from the room and bade them to take a seat.

“Welcome back, Finn. It’s been a while, but I’d like to thank you for everything you did for us on Starkiller. You’re a hero.” General Organa reached across the desk to take his hand. Poe was sure he saw Finn flush.

Finn cleared his throat, “Well, thank you.”

“Years ago I would pin a medal on your chest for what you did, but I’m afraid you’ll have to settle for the gratitude of an old woman.”

“And everyone else in the galaxy,” murmured Poe.

“Ma’am- um, General Organa, I needed to speak with you urgently about Rey.” Finn looked like this gratitude was making him a bit uncomfortable and he was anxious to get to the real reason he had come.

“Yes, Finn?”

“She’s- we have to go back for her. I have to go back for her. There’s no way I can leave her in the hands of the First Order.” The words spilled out with very little to stop them.

General Organa was uncharacteristically unreadable. “Finn, there’s no certainty that she’s even alive right now, let alone that the First Order has her in custody.”

Finn’s eyes were locked on hers. “You have the force,” he said like an accusation. “Do you think she’s dead? Can you feel it?”

The General didn’t say anything. Poe had no idea whether she was searching for one lost girl in the galaxy or trying to work out how to tell Finn what she already knew. It was impossible to say whether or what Leia knew until she finally opened her mouth.

“No. I can’t feel her now, but for you, that’s a good thing. I would sense it if she had died. She was strong in the force and her loss would have caused a disturbance. I’ll admit that I have been preoccupied with other things lately,” The death of her husband was achingly fresh. “But no, I think Rey escaped Starkiller Base.”

Finn broke out into a large smile before restraining himself. “Ok! Ok. So, we rescue her now, right? If we don’t have her, but she’s still alive, she’s got to be with the First Order-”

“Finn, Finn! Slow down. I’m afraid this isn’t going to be like the last time. There is no way we will be able to get the approval for another full-scale assault on the First Order so soon. We can’t even be sure of where they are right now. No, I’m sorry, but rescuing Rey is going to have to wait.”

Poe saw the look on Finn’s face and felt duty-bound to step in. “General Organa, perhaps we could attempt something smaller. I could take Finn-”

“I didn’t realize you were so eager to return to First Order custody.” Poe froze instantly. “I thought not. I don’t want to leave Rey in their hands any more than you do, but the fact remains: we’re not ready to face the First Order again. We don’t have the intel, we don’t have the numbers, and we don’t have the opportunity. I will do everything in my power to rescue her as soon as we can. I need you to trust me.”

That was good enough for Poe, but he looked over at his friend to see what Finn thought. Finn had only known Leia for a day at most. To ask him to put his trust in her, to put his friend’s life in her hands, was asking a lot. His face was a mask, nearly impenetrable. 

“Fine,” said Finn. “But promise me. Promise me that you’ll keep me in the loop and the second you find out anything, I’ll be the first to know.”

General Organa nodded, as though considering his proposal. “Yes, I think I can do that.” She stood, giving them their cue to do the same. “You are both vital to our success as an organization. I hope you know that we couldn’t do this without the both of you.”

She took both of their hands. “I’m sure I don’t have to ask this, but if the time does come where we can rescue her-”

“You don’t even have to ask,” said Poe. He could feel Finn relax at his side.   
\--------------------------- 

Phasma brought her to a different room tonight. It lacked all of the machines Rey had no fondness for and was instead covered in mats with benches along the wall and a circle printed on the floor in the center of the room. 

“I want to try something different tonight,” she said, sitting down on a bench and beginning to tape her hands. Rey wasn’t sure why.

“I’ll be glad to stop weightlifting.” Rey laughed and she was glad to be putting her free time to activities that did more than cause her whole body to ache. “What did you have in mind?” 

“Have you ever fought before?” The question was tentative as though Phasma was still trying to feel her out.

“Not extensively.” Rey paused, “Though I’ve been known to hold my own in a fight.”

“Nothing formal, though,” said Phasma, ignoring her lightly sarcastic reference to her encounters with Kylo Ren.

“Not like you. Why? What is it?”

“I thought we could try wrestling.” Phasma avoided looking at Rey and instead studied the taping job she had done on her hands.

Rey couldn’t help sizing up her potential opponent. She knew Phasma was taller, more muscular, more experienced. If Rey was just an ordinary opponent, there would be no question as to who would win in a fight. Rey, however, had proven that she was no ordinary opponent.

She realized she hadn’t given an answer when Phasma looked up at her with clear blue eyes and bright red lips. “Sure.”

Phasma’s brow crinkled, as though she hadn’t heard her correctly. “Are you sure? We could just go back-”

“No, let’s do it. I’m surprised they would let me learn how to fight.” Rey’s body hummed in anticipation.

Phasma, who had been about to stand up, sat back down quickly. “There is no ‘they’. I made this decision.”

“Really?”

“Really. Now do you want to do this or not?” And Rey found that she really, really did.

She sat down next to Phasma and held out her hand to her. “This protects your fingers from impact.”

“Impact?”

Phasma looked up. “I want you to hit me... if you can.” She smiled. 

Rey flexed her bound fingers as Phasma moved to the other hand. She looked down when Phasma finished but was still holding her hand. “Have you ever thrown a punch before?” Rey curled her hand into a fist.

“Oh no,” Phasma shook her head. Her hands shifted the position of Rey’s thumb and relaxed her fingers before using Rey’s new fist to mime a punch to her face.

“So we’ll get in the ring,” she nodded to the circle in the middle of the ground. “and you’ll try to pin me or knock me out of the circle.”

“And you’ll be doing the same?”

Phasma cracked her knuckles. “I’ll go easy on you.”

Rey could practically hear the Force rushing past her ears. “If you say so.”

They squared off, circling each other with narrowed, uncertain eyes. Phasma was intimidating, sharp, and focused. Rey’s mind was elsewhere, unable to take Phasma seriously for some reason, likely to do with their new amicable relationship.

Rey tried to focus, but it felt half-hearted. That was until Phasma lunged at her. 

Her right fist flew towards Rey’s face and ducked under it at the last moment. Shocked, Rey stood up straight in confusion before narrowly avoiding a kick to the stomach.

“Do you plan on fighting back anytime soon?” asked Phasma behind raised fists.

Rey considered this for a moment before moving with great speed. One fist connected with Phasma’s chest, for all the good it did. She swung again and Phasma leaned sideways to allow her to fall forward a step.

“That’s more like it.” Phasma laughed.

It was hard to be incensed by a laugh she had been dying to hear. They circled once more before Rey made the first move. She ran and grabbed her opponent by the shoulders before realizing a strength contest was not something she could win against Phasma. 

Instead of being knocked down, she let her knees fall forward and slipped between Phasma’s legs. She nearly succeeded when her legs were caught from behind causing her to fall as well.

Both women sat up and faced each other. Rey’s breathing was heavier than before and she noticed Phasma’s red cheeks above her grin.

Rey had barely gotten up before Phasma was on her once more. She could feel Phasma’s heavy breath on her neck as she pinned Rey to the mat. 

Her back hit the ground hard and she gasped for air immediately. Her legs were locked into place by Phasma kneeling above her. The hands that had knocked her down were supporting Phasma in looking down at her.

“This was fun,” said Rey between breaths. She had never heard Phasma laugh like that before: sweet and loud and long.

The blonde rolled off her and offered a hand to Rey to get up. “Had enough?”

Part of Rey wanted to go again, the song in her veins not quenched by a few quick blows. Instead, she said, “I think I have a lot more to learn before I’m ready to beat you.”

Phasma smiled. “Then I look forward to teaching you.”

They were still holding hands, Rey realized but didn’t immediately pull hers away. The tape on her knuckles formed an unwanted barrier, but her thumb, free and unencumbered brushed a circle or two on the back of the other’s palm.

It didn’t last. They actually had to do things with their hands, but Rey liked it while it lasted.

Phasma showed her a few of the basic fighting forms. She learned how to hold her head, where to place her feet, how should she bend her knees, and where she should balance her weight. They didn’t throw any more punches at each other and Rey was grateful for the firm hands around her waist and the gentle touches that moved her into position.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Sorry for the wait!


	6. Chapter 6

The General didn’t come to her cell the next day. While Rey wasn’t necessarily surprised, she was bored. No one came to her room for hours. It didn’t feel like it was meant to be torture; they just didn’t have anything to do with the workings of a military ship. She was a prisoner, a valuable one, but one that didn’t have an immediate use.

She used those hours to expand her mind through the use of the force. It was difficult at first, like stumbling around in the dark, but she could tell she was getting better at it every minute.

It was easy to pass hours like that; sitting on the bed with her eyes closed. The security feed of her room must have been dreadfully boring.

In her meditation, Rey sensed something on the ship that sent her fleeing back to her cell instantly. It was a cold darkness emanating from a far-off corner of the ship. She had never traveled that far in her use of the force before and had never felt anything like it. Well, that is, not exactly like it.

Rey knew that she had found Kylo Ren. He was awake now and the idea sent a shiver down her spine. The question was, had he felt her too?

After midday, signaled by the arrival of lunch, Rey decided to do something else to divert her attention. Walking the halls of the Finalizer suddenly felt dangerous to her. Instead, she remembered one of the stories she had heard once about the Jedi: that they could move objects with their minds.

She had seen Kylo Ren do it, so there had to be more truth than myth to this story. The cleaning droid had not come back to take her meal tray, so she decided to experiment on it. 

With her eyes pressed closed, she tried to picture the tray in her mind, the same way she would if she was going to walk outside of herself the way she had done before. The room beyond her came into focus in her mind’s eye, so real she thought she could reach out and touch the cold durasteel walls. She looked down at the tray and it seemed so feasible to reach out and grab it, to lift it and carry it in her imaginary hands.

Rey felt nothing but air as her hand passed right through it. She tried again and again in the same way, but nothing happened. When she opened her eyes once again, the try was stubbornly unmoved.

Perhaps she had hoped for too much. Much to do with the force had come easily to her until now. Maybe this was something that would take practice for her to master.

She thought of Luke Skywalker, another legend who had suddenly become very real to her; the mythical boy who saved the galaxy from the evil clutches of the Empire it’s evil emperor. In another life, she might have studied with him and become a Jedi herself. If things had only gone differently in this life, she might have been on her way to find him now.

Stop it, she told herself. Thinking of what could have been was no way to live. She had been through this all before. Bad things happened and there was no sense in wishing they hadn’t. 

There were many nights she spent alone on Jakku, wishing her family would come back down from the stars. She would lie in bed awake with the tightness in her chest, a pain that never really went away just ebbed and flowed like the tide. It was worst at night when there was nothing to distract the mind from the things that bothered it most. When it knew you were cold and hungry and so terribly alone and wondered how the hell it had come to this.

Her family had abandoned her a long time ago and she was never going to see them again. There was a part of herself that had hidden that realization from her for many years. It had only come out again once she had left Jakku behind for good.

At the time, she hadn’t been able to explain to Finn why she wanted, needed to go back to that place that had made her miserable for so long. The words became tangled up in that tight anxiety in her chest and she was unable to speak.

Without realizing it was happening, Rey realized her cheeks were wet. Silent tears slid down her face. 

It had been years since she had last cried like this. Just like thinking about the past, once you start crying it becomes hard to stop. 

Rey’s breath shuddered in her chest. She squeezed her eyes shut to try to make it stop. She wouldn’t do this now, not here. Being this vulnerable in the hands of the First Order would make this awful situation seem even worse. 

All she had to do was clear her mind, just as she did all those nights in the desert. Those rolling dunes were easy to call to her. Perhaps they would fade away eventually, like the spots of light imprinted in your eyes after looking at something bright. For now, they felt closer than ever.

Phasma came, at last, to collect her for the evening. Rey couldn’t have been happier to leave that room. Her eyes went wide taking in everything about the change of scenery.

They didn’t say much as they walked to the training room or as they warmed up. Phasma wasn’t exactly a seasoned conversationalist and Rey wasn’t in the best mood. On top of that, Phasma tended not to notice the emotions of others unless it affected her. Because of this, only as they began their first sparring match of the night did Phasma stop and cross her arms.

“Is something wrong?” Her voice demanded an answer. She didn’t seem to recognize how ridiculous her question was.

Rey might have laughed if she didn’t think it would unleash the tightness in her chest. “Aside from everything?”

Phasma didn’t find that funny. “I had you pegged as being a bit stronger than that.”

“Like you?” asked Rey, bitterly. “Hours of solitary confinement makes it hard to be strong. I…” She hated giving voice to the dozens of fears she barely gave space to in her head. “I feel so trapped. Even just walking out into the hallway made me feel like I could breathe a little easier.”

“You are a prisoner.” 

“I am abundantly aware,” said Rey. “But I’ve played along with your rules and haven’t been a threat and was still locked in a room for hours. I’m going mad.”

Phasma seemed to consider this before nodding. Her eyes were locked on Rey’s, as though trying to see through her. “Have you ever spent this much time on a starship before?”

Rey shook her head “Almost never.”

“We get this sometimes with the younger recruits. A sort of claustrophobia towards being in space.”

This sounded plausible. “But it’s not just that. Being alone, having nothing to do for hours on end. I can’t take it. Even being interrogated was better than this.”

“You need someone to talk to?” Rey couldn’t tell if Phasma was making light of her emotions. It sounded like it, but the look on Phasma’s face seemed serious.

“Anything. I know that I’m imprisoned, but I feel like I’m much more of a danger if I’m not occupied. That seems to be the General’s thought process too.”

Phasma frowned for a moment. “I have an idea that I think could work. I’ll suggest it to General Hux tomorrow. In the meantime, shall we spar?”

It seemed like the discussion was over for Phasma and Rey felt like it was all she could do to accept it. Rey couldn’t tell if Phasma’s idea was something to feel hopeful about, but what was there left to hope for.

Once they started, the blows came sharp and quick. Phasma didn’t wait to test the waters before diving right in to try to catch Rey off guard. While she wasn’t paying full attention, Rey managed to escape the right-handed swing that came flying at her. It jolted her back to reality and she snapped to the ready.

She dodged two jabs and a knee to the chest. In the moment Phasma needed to regroup, Rey ducked around behind her back. Rey hadn’t been quick enough to hit Phasma before the blonde whirled around with a wide-armed blow she was able to duck.

Both women were panting. Rey felt a light sweat coming on. She put her arms up, hands balled into fists the way Phasma had shown her.

She could sense the mocking question on Phasma’s lips and decided to answer before it could be asked. One long kick opened as a distraction. Two high hits followed, right and then left, and then one aimed lower. 

The last hit connected and Phasma took a half step back. She came back in a fury. One, two, three high blows. The second connected with Rey’s jaw. She saw white as she felt Phasma’s knee hit her gut.

Rather than fall to her knees, Rey leaped forward. Phasma’s back hit the ground in an instant. Her mouth opened in a gasp as the air was knocked out of her. That didn’t stop her from wrapping her long legs tight around Rey’s waist. They were like pythons keeping her locked in place. 

Rey paused for a moment on her hands and knees above Phasma. The adrenaline in her veins was already receding. With each breath, she took in more of the woman beneath her.

It didn’t last long. With her legs and in one fluid motion, Phasma rolled on top of Rey. She pinned Rey’s wrists to the floor as if to declare her victory.

“Better,” said Phasma, not letting Rey up from the floor just yet. 

Rey smiled. “I totally won. I had you pinned.”

“Mmm… and yet you’re the one on the ground.” answered Phasma, sounding almost playful.

Rey pouted. “You cheated. Now let me up.”

The imperious look Phasma gave her made her feel almost the opposite of the tightness that had occupied her chest before. “Maybe I won’t. You should make me.”

Rey found herself speechless and staring up at Phasma. Her lips parted and wondering.

After a moment of inaction, Phasma rolled off of her and helped Rey to her feet. They headed to the showers in silence once again. 

It took some convincing, but Rey persuaded Phasma to let her walk back to her room alone. The woman conceded that she did have reports to fill out that would take her well into the night to complete and that she should get started on. Only after comm-ing the guard currently stationed outside of Rey’s room did she give her consent. 

She didn’t think it was because Phasma didn’t trust her, but had more to do with following protocol and avoiding a hassle.

The lights in the hallways closer to her quarters were dimmed at this hour of the day cycle. She supposed that crew members who worked different hours lived in rooms in another part of the ship where their lights were now at full brightness.

After making the trip several times by now, Rey was confident she knew exactly where she was going… until she got to just about where she was supposed to be. Had she passed the room? She knew she had gone the right way but had she walked too far?

Then she saw a figure at the far end of the corridor. 

He was tall with dark hair, wearing dark clothes, and walking towards her. Rey felt her blood chill. It was Kylo Ren. What she had sensed before had been correct. He must have recovered enough to be released from the med bay.

She stopped immediately and he did the same. It was evident he hadn’t noticed her until she’d reacted in alarm. That had pulled him from his own thoughts and drew his eyes to her.

“Rey,” he started, but Rey turned her back to him and began walking the way she came. 

“I’m not going to chase you.” He said when she refused to slow down. He started to follow her. Shouldn’t there have been a stormtrooper outside her room?

“I’m afraid he’s otherwise occupied. Can we talk?”

She paused long enough to turn and refute that. “Didn’t you already have your chance at that?”

Kylo lowered his eyes to the floor. “I made a mistake.”

“Torture isn’t an easy mistake to make.” Rey couldn’t believe she was even entertaining the idea of talking to Kylo Ren.

“I didn’t torture-”

“And what about what you did to Han Solo?” She was yelling and had no intention of holding back. “You murdered him in cold blood, your own-” 

She felt pressure on her throat, like a hand wrapped around her windpipe but not squeezing. Regardless, she stopped talking.

“My reasons for killing Han Solo are complicated and none of your business unless you let me explain myself.” His hands were clenched and he looked as though restraining himself from choking her was taking all of his efforts.

Rey wasn’t sure she trusted herself enough to speak, so she turned away once more.

“This is going to happen whether you will it or not. I was trying to be civil.”

“When we met you took off your mask to prove you weren’t a monster. Nothing you have done makes me believe that. Leave me alone and maybe I’ll consider letting you talk to me.”

She left him there in the hall and to her surprise he let her leave. Heart pounding, she made a few turns at random before feeling sure that he wasn’t nearby. It was very likely that he could still sense her in the force, but she needed to calm down and swallow the fear she’d felt in that moment. After their last encounter, it wasn’t unlikely for him to try to kill her on site and she was completely unarmed.

She slid down a blank durasteel wall, not at all sure where she was anymore, and held her head in her hands.

It took her a moment to understand her feelings. She wasn’t afraid of Kylo Ren. She saw him for what he was. The fire in her veins was instinct, telling her to defend herself or run because, while she had a chance of defeating him in a fair fight, the time to do so was not at hand. Rey’s blood sang for want of a lightsaber, overwhelming but not enough to cloud her judgment. Instead, her reasoning and responses were sharpened to a knife’s edge to compensate.

Her fight or flight response kept her frozen on the floor. All of the adrenaline from her fight with Phasma was back in full force. She tried to slow her breathing. She was fine. Nothing had happened. She was safe.

Except she wasn’t. It was possible she would never be remotely safe again. She was trapped, a prisoner of the evilest people in the galaxy and there was little hope that she would ever be free of them. 

Sure, Rey had survived her first encounter with Kylo Ren since Starkiller, but he wasn’t wrong. They would meet again and again. She would have to face him all over again. He wanted to explain himself to her? Maybe he didn’t deserve the chance. After all of the terrible things he had done to people she cared about in the short time that she had known him, it felt like he had already run out of chances.

She was going to have to live for the time being on the same ship as Kylo Ren. Kylo Ren who might have killed Finn and Han Solo within minutes of each other. Kylo Ren who terrorized a village on Jakku for information, who had been close to torturing her, who worked for people who destroyed entire star systems.

Rey was panicking, for the first time since she had entered this spiral. Everything in her life had changed so much in the last few days and suddenly it seemed like the whole messy end was laid out in front of her. Her breathing was erratic and she couldn’t seem to get up from the floor.

She didn’t hear the footsteps that eventually came echoing down the hall.

“There you are.” said a voice that Rey was surprised to be pleased to hear. It was Phasma who offered an arm to bring her to her feet. 

“I expected a comm from the guard when you got to your room. I was worried when I didn’t receive one.”

Rey resisted the urge to cling to someone so solid and real. As they walked side by side, she tried to calm down by reminding herself that Phasma was only worried about her job not for her. The thought was sufficient to dampen the smile on her face to a more neutral expression.

“I’m fine,” she lied. The words came easily to her now that Phasma was here. “I must have passed the room by mistake.”

“The trooper should have been outside waiting for you.” Phasma’s brows drew together.

“He may have had a run in with Kylo Ren.” She tried to downplay the fear the whole situation had brought her. Could that nameless stormtrooper be injured or worse because of Kylo Ren?

“May have? Is Kylo Ren even cleared from medical?”

Rey decided to be direct. “I spoke to him, so yes.”

“His rooms aren’t even… oh.” The Captain came to a conclusion she didn’t share with Rey. 

Her memory had been pretty good when it came to finding her room. She had passed it only by a few doors, just as she’d thought. 

A green light allowed Rey entry and she went in to sit on her bed. Phasma paused at the door. “Are you alright?” she asked sounding like she wanted to say something else, but didn’t have the words. 

“I’m fine,” said Rey. “Really fine. You should get back to your work.”

“I have to find the missing trooper, whatever Ren did to him.”

“You think Ren attacked him?” Rey was incredulous.

Phasma considered the possibility. “No,” she decided. “but if he hasn't shown up for his shift yet he isn’t going to be in good shape. Likely he got caught in the crosshairs of some great tantrum of sorts.”

It sounded like she was used to that sort of thing and Rey was morbidly fascinated but restrained herself. 

It looked as though Phasma was having trouble reading Rey’s condition. She was likely still concerned by why she had found Rey on the floor. Rey wasn’t ready to answer her questions honestly. Instead, she asked one of her own. She wasn’t sure Phasma could help her with this problem, but at this point, it couldn’t hurt to say what she was thinking out loud.

“Do you think I should speak to Kylo Ren again?” She started off slowly. Her voice felt a bit raw from before. “Everything in me is telling me not to, but I also know that sooner or later I might not have a choice.”

Phasma was taken aback. “I… I don’t believe it is my place to say, but… I believe you should… well, you should do whatever you think is best. You’re not in a position that affords you a great deal of comfort, so you should take whatever opportunity you have to make things better for yourself that you can, even if that means steadfastly avoiding Kylo Ren. That being said, you’re right. This is your opportunity to speak with him on your own terms. Better to do that when he’s at your mercy than the other way around.”

She reasoned like a strategist and for once, Rey was grateful. Deep down, she’d suspected that this would have to be the case, but it sounded much more reasonable coming from another person's lips.

“Thank you, really.” She said and affirmed when Phasma looked slightly skeptical. “I don’t want to put you in a position of disloyalty, but I really do appreciate your honesty. Good night, Phasma.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An update? Yes, an update! Sorry to keep you waiting. October was a bit of a wild ride for me, but I feel like November's going to be better. Thank you so much for the support!


	7. Chapter 7

It was late in the night cycle when Phasma finally finished the reports she had needed to catch up on. She could have waited until the morning to turn in the physical copies, but she knew that General Hux was likely wide awake and ready to receive them. There was no reason to suspect that the destruction of his prized superweapon had cured his insomnia so she made her way to the General’s chambers.

She halted abruptly, however, when she heard someone come running from the other end of the corridor. She hoped whoever it was hadn’t seen her pause at the corner of the new corridor before ducking back. The cold durasteel wall raised goosebumps on her arms. Something told her that the person had been in much too big a hurry to notice her, but if it was who she suspected it to be, he wouldn’t have had to see her to know she was there.

From down the hall, she heard the door slide open. The voices echoed without their speaker’s consent. 

“What are you doing here?” Hux hissed, not about to let Kylo in just yet. “I instructed the medical officers to send me hourly-”

Kylo spoke quickly over him, as though he hadn’t said a word. “Hux, I was released from the infirmary and I ran into the scavenger on my way here. She’s on board? How long has she-”

Hux cut him off. “We are transporting her to the Supreme Leader’s temple as ordered. We are on course to be there in four days.”

“Hux-” he tried again.

“You are to leave her alone, Kylo. That’s an order.”

“You don’t give orders to me.” There was a darkness coloring his tone.

“No,” Hux conceded. “But this is one I suggest you follow. I’ve been closely monitoring her status and have managed to keep her contained thus far. We are only four days out and any change in her regimen could lead to another escape. We are so close, Kylo. So very, very close to succeeding here.”

There was a softness in his voice Phasma knew she wasn’t meant to hear. 

“Fine. The two of us will have to travel to Supreme Leader together in a few days time. I can wait.”

“Looks like you’ve learned some patience since the last time we spoke.” She could hear the smirk in Hux’s voice as he spoke.

“Getting your ass kicked has that effect on people.” Phasma thought she heard one of them laugh.

There was some shuffling in the doorway. She didn’t dare move to see what was going on.

“No,” Hux said, at last. “Tomorrow, certainly. I’ll check to see how you’re doing in the morning.”

Kylo Ren swallowed. “Right.” His voice was tighter than before. “You should get some sleep. It’s probably even later than I think it is.”

Phasma heard a small sound she couldn’t quite place. 

“Good night, Kylo.” The sentiment was returned and Kylo Ren walked back the way he came.

Phasma supposed that he had been far too caught up in the moment to investigate her presence down the hall or perhaps he didn’t care so long as she gave them some level of privacy. Regardless, Phasma gave the General a few moments to compose himself before signaling her presence outside his quarters. He was only marginally disheveled when he opened the door, though not in any way anyone but her and a few others would recognize.

“Phasma,” he said slowly, his mind picking up speed in order to figure out why she was outside his door. “You finished the reports.”

“Yes, sir. I suppose it could have waited until morning…”

“But you knew I’d be awake.” he finished taking her proffered data pad and transferring the files manually to his own. 

“The gesture is much appreciated.” He continued. “As is your promptness. Troop quotas and supply consignment summaries seem so trivial during the day.” The file transfer completed with a ping. “But must be completed nonetheless.”

“I would not presume to say anything about the General’s health, but perhaps they’ll be mundane enough to give you a few hours of sleep.” she started, not wanting to say too much.

“The sentiment is noted, Phasma, but it does not appear that they did so for you.” He returned the datapad back. “Would you care for a drink?”

Phasma didn’t have very much to be getting on with at the moment. She told herself that it really wasn’t that late before she accepted his offer. They’d done this a few times before when they were stationed together. The phrase ‘it’s lonely at the top’ seemed to ring true and she was rarely treated to moments of true and close to equal companionship. Besides, the General looked as though he needed to talk.

His quarters were nearly identical to every other officer’s on the ship with a few minor differences. The Finalizer was General Hux’s flagship, given to him on his promotion. His room was wider by a few feet, contained a desk, and a small seating area where other rooms might only have a simple chair.

Hux went through his belongings and retrieved a bottle of Corellian brandy, a personal favorite. Phasma was handed a short glass of amber liquid and took a sip to mull over. 

“I hear Kylo Ren was released from the med bay today.” She said to start.

“Did you hear him from down the hallway? He was let out less than a half hour ago. I only just saw him myself.” 

Phasma refused to admit to eavesdropping. “How was he?”

Hux snorted. “He appeared to be fine, as though he wasn’t nearly cut down mere days ago. I swear the man is built like a nerf.”

Phasma chuckled into another sip of her drink before finishing it. Hux had it filled again in a flash. The goal wasn’t to get drunk, but a welcome buzz would be much appreciated by both of them.

“I swear most of the stormtroopers don’t think he’s human,” she said.

“Why would they?” Hux laughed. “I thought he was a dwarf Wookiee myself until I saw him without the mask on.” He paused thoughtfully, “Though, now I realize the helmet and cowl would be dreadfully hot with all that fur underneath.”

“What about the mane he does have?” Their shared laughter bubbled over. “There’s no way he doesn’t use the force to keep away the helmet hair,” she continued, “and I know a thing or two about helmet hair.”

“The force works in mysterious ways,” Hux said sagely, with as straight an expression as he could manage. “He absolutely does.” He added in a confidential tone. 

They finished the bottle swiftly, in a hazy sort of half euphoria. Two spots of red appeared high on the General’s cheekbones. Phasma could feel the flush on her own face. Hux pulled out a second bottle and Phasma resolved as he pulled out the stopper to pace herself better than Hux.

“The girl,” The General started, but his mind seemed to trail off.

“There are quite a few girls on the ship, Hux, you’re going to have to be more specific,” she said with a small grin.

“The scavenger, Rey.” His brow knit together with the little bit more concentration it was taking to put his words together precisely the way he wanted to. “You have feelings for her don’t you.”

The grin on Phasma’s face dipped slightly, but she said nothing.

“I was right from the beginning!” said Hux, far more excited than he should have been. “I got high scores on all of my aptitude tests, but even I’m not usually that good. Though, the way you’ve been spending every night with her has been a pretty good indicator. I’ve seen the security camera footage. Who authorized you to teach her combat?”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Phasma was proud of herself for not stuttering or succumbing to the slur that was almost present in her words.

Hux crossed one leg over his other at the knee. “Don’t I? You’re more than aware of my feelings for Kylo Ren and no matter how hard I’ve tried to deny them to myself and others, they are more than evident. I love him,” he paused, seeming to think that the words had been asserted by someone else, but then nodded to concede that, though surprising even to himself, they were true. “And I think you’re beginning to suspect that you do too. For the girl, of course.”

Phasma tried to interrupt his stream of consciousness, but Hux held up a hand to her. She wanted to smack his ruddy, smug, condescending face. She had always known he had a fondness for hearing himself talk.

“I know it’s only been a few days, but I also know that these force sensitive types have a way of getting under your skin when you least expect it... until they’re a part of you.” Phasma hadn’t realized how much more alcohol Hux had consumed than her until she saw tears welling in his eyes as he said this last bit.

Phasma was speechless and, thankfully, so was Hux. She knew that she liked the girl, but hadn’t allowed herself to fully assess her feelings. It was her job, her duty to the First Order to guard and monitor Rey and somewhere along the way she had confused orders with real friendship. She had let the girl go back to her room on her own tonight, as though she weren’t a dangerous force user and prisoner, as though she was a person Phasma could know truly and deeply, as though she were a person Phasma could like.

Her eyes filled with tears. With blurred vision, she left Hux and returned to her own quarters, not too far away, thank goodness. Her room felt far too cold and dark when the door slid open and she entered alone.

She felt empty. She felt as though she was both a person with emotions and thoughts and a droid that did exactly what it was programmed to do, and the droid had no idea what to do with these fickle emotions. She had never felt a duality like this like she was one or the other. She had never even felt that she was more one or the other. She had never let herself become one of those robot stormtroopers, the ones churned out by the routine simulations. She was wild and untamed and proud to be so, even if she had to put on a robotic face for the masses. Captain Phasma was feared and respected. She was good at what she did and no one questioned that. 

Ever since she had allowed her feelings for Rey to dictate her actions, she had begun to let it dictate who she was. She hadn’t ever questioned those actions. She wanted to visit Rey in the med bay so she did. She wanted to follow orders especially if that meant spending more time with her, so she did. She wanted to get to know her better and liked what she found, so she found ways to spend more time with her.

She started acting on her own thoughts and emotions and suddenly this made her a different person. Was she even herself to begin with? What kind of person ignored their own thoughts and desires?

A droid, she thought, a suit of metal armor that can give orders and process information for itself, but doesn’t have a sense of self to cling onto. 

The tears that stung her eyes as she left the General’s quarters fell only when she was in the privacy of her own bed. She remembered nights when troopers in the Academy had cried into their sheets. She laughed at them for being weak. It was not too long ago that she had survived this too, and without letting others know her pain.

Was she jealous that they even remembered enough of their homes and families to cry for them? That they had fond memories to return to in their dreams? No. She was glad she had forgotten. 

Now she cried because at last, she remembered, what it felt like to feel things for herself. It was a very scary thing, and so she cried.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait! I wasn't sure where I wanted to split the chapter up, and then I wasn't sure if this was enough of a section to call a chapter. I decided to go for it because something is better than nothing. This weekend I'll probably pull back the curtain and see what it will take to actually finish this thing and I'll update the "?" for how many chapters this will have. 
> 
> As always, thanks for reading, leaving kudos, and commenting! My heart gets all warm and fuzzy every time I get one of those ao3 emails.


	8. Chapter 8

Rey couldn’t sit still. She had this incessant feeling that something was about to happen. At first, it was easy to dismiss her uneasiness as anxiety, but now that it was keeping her awake at night she was forced to consider the growing possibility that this feeling indicated something else. It was like knowing that a storm was coming and this should have been redundant considering her present situation, but it was present all the same. Something big was about to happen and she could only hope that it was going to be something good.

It was like a buzzing in her ears and in her blood. She assumed it was the force in her, trying to spur her to action. Too bad it wasn’t able to be a little bit more specific in what exactly it wanted her to do about it. Nope. Instead, it was slowly driving her insane and it had only been two days since it had begun.

She sat up on her bed in the middle of the night for the second night in a row. Holding her head in her hands, she rocked her head back and forth, easing real and imagined stresses. She couldn’t sleep and she was afraid it was beginning to show.

With long, deep breaths, Rey closed her eyes. 

There wasn’t a particular method to her meditation yet. It was a process of seeing without opening her eyes, like walking around the room and touching things without getting up. It was like drawing a picture line by line until you figured out what it was supposed to be. When she was tired or stressed, she imaged the desert on Jakku. She would walk out into the sand, wandering farther and farther out, far past where she had ever dared travel in real life, all while keeping a mental tie to her home and the Niima outpost.

Tonight was closer to the latter. She tried to wander out into the sand wastes of her old planet, but found herself somewhere else… somewhere she only vaguely recognized. This made it hard to sink deeper into her usual meditative state. 

It was a struggle that lasted almost a half hour until at last, she decided to give up for the night. She found herself staring absently at the boots she had shed before retiring for a fitful night’s sleep. Her mind drifted to the stories she had known as a child, unsure of where she’d first heard them, of the Jedi and Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader. 

She had been far more interested in the pilots of the rebellion was she was little. The Resistance fighter helmet she’d kept in her home was a sort of childish hero worship she’d maintained. Luke Skywalker, Wedge Antilles, and Shara Bey were her idols. They were the best at what they did and what they did was pretty amazing to an earthbound little girl. She didn’t remember much of what her family had been like, but she retained a few memories of flying in ships and working on them with a pair of big, callused hands to guide her small fingers to the right wires and gauges.

The Jedi hadn’t been a source of her greatest feats of imagination, those had been focused on flying high above the clouds and in the darkness of the space between planets. She had been told about the Jedi and all the myths, but for the most part, none of it had seemed true. 

When she’d met Han Solo and Leia Organa and learned that not only was it all true, but she was one of them, it had been a bit too much to believe. She had always been a bit special, able to read people and understand what they were feeling. Unkar Plutt had tried to sell her into slavery as a child, but she sensed it and convinced him she was more valuable as a scavenger. There was a time when she’d sensed distress not too far from her home and found Teeto trying to make off with a smaller creature that had wandered away from town. These were small things, things she hadn’t questioned at the time, but now seemed to like signs of something bigger.

Then she faced off against a flesh and blood force user and held a lightsaber. And now, there could be no turning back.

The legends said many things about the Jedi and Rey had no way of knowing what was true. Most seemed to agree about one thing though. The Jedi could cause objects to move without touching them, hold things in place or float them across the room. She eyed the boots she had tossed aside. While the thought of it seemed mostly impossible, it also felt strangely doable.

She closed her eyes and found the shoes in her room. Tentative hands in her mind’s eye held them and imagined them until she almost felt them in her corporeal hands. The laces, the rubber soles, the leather tips were almost tangible from across the room. 

Then she imagined them exactly where they were at the foot of her bed, one knocked over and neither carefully placed. Slowly, she began to picture one rising off the floor held up by nothing visible and dangling from thin air by its shoestring. At first, it merely hovered above the ground, then it rose about a foot high, then it was over her bed, and soon it was touching the ceiling. 

Not sure she was ready, Rey opened eyes.

The boot was stubbornly at the foot of her bed. 

She tried not to get upset over its indignant slouch, but it was a bit difficult. It had felt real when she pictured it happening in her mind. Wasn’t this supposed to be easy for Jedi?

It took another two tries for her to want to throw the boots across the room herself. Part of her couldn’t believe this wasn’t working, while a small piece told her she was silly for even trying this at all.

‘No,’ she thought. ‘I know what I felt. Kriff, even Kylo Ren knows what I felt. I’ve known ever since I picked up that lightsaber in Maz Kanata’s cantina that the force was in me. I can do this. This is not impossible or absurd. This is as natural as breathing and I will make this stupid boot move.’

She took a deep breath, swallowed all of that inspiration, and tried again.

The process was becoming innate at this point. She had done it so many times in an attempt to achieve the same result and now she was even more determined to make it happen.  
In her mind, the boot bobbed along the ceiling several feet above where she sat. She took another steadying breath, knew that the boot would be exactly where she saw it now in her mind’s eye, and her eyes flicked open to the spot.

A wave of shock almost sent the boot tumbling to the floor. Instead, it dipped slightly in its altitude above her. 

With a thought, it plummeted and she caught it deftly just before it hit her lap. She couldn’t help the smile that arched across her face. It felt like the force was smiling with her and somewhere out in the galaxy a voice congratulated her success.

When the door to her cell opened, Rey jolted in surprise. According to the schedule, she was forced to grow accustomed to, there was no reason someone should come to call on her. It was early for her midday meal and that usually came to her by a droid and not a person. 

It was one of the guards that usually kept watch outside her room.

Rey was about to jump to her feet, excited about the possibility of something new and different. Then a sense of the stormtrooper’s nervousness told her to stay where she was. These soldiers still saw her as a terrifying force user, capable of anything. She could be just as monstrous as Kylo Ren. She might fling him across the room and choke him until he hung there limp and lifeless. Rey didn’t want to needlessly intimidate some unimportant trooper. There was a chance he was like Finn and didn’t want to be here at all, or more likely, that he didn’t have a choice in whether he wanted to be here or not.

“You’re to come with us,” The trooper motioned to another one just outside the door. 

Rey stood slowly and kept continuous eye contact, as though she were approaching a small child or an unfamiliar animal. The trooper seemed to relax when he saw her cooperation, at the very least he put his blaster down. 

As they walked through the halls, Rey found herself still unable to contain the wide-eyed curiosity that she felt every time she ventured outside of her room and into some new area of the ship. 

“Where are we going?” she asked, not sure if either of her guards would respond. 

They seemed to look at each other briefly, an inexplicable gesture due to their helmet’s lack of facial expression, before the one to her right, the one who had first addressed her, answered. 

“You’re being allowed to socialize during your midday meal.” 

Rey brightened instantly. “Oh! So I’ll be having lunch with you?”

“And some other members of our squadron,” Both of the stormtroopers went back to looking serious again. Neither of them seemed to know what to do with her open excitement.

“What are your names?” asked Rey. “I feel like I should have asked this before, but it’s so hard to tell all of you apart.”

They looked as though they were about to give each other another searching look, without the visible eyes needed to do such a thing, but the one to her right answered instead. 

“I am LM-3484 and this is LM-4333.”

Rey grimaced a little. “Don’t you have real names? Or nicknames for each other at least?”

The two stormtroopers were unable to resist giving each other side eye from behind their helmets. Rey assumed they had to be very close if not related. They were so completely in sync, in ways beyond the usual rank and file demeanor that made all stormtroopers look the same.

“Well, no one is supposed to have a name,” started LM-3484. LM-4333 looked around to make sure no one was watching before giving LM-3484 a shove.

“Ouch!”

“Why would you admit to the prisoner that we break protocol?” asked LM-4333.

LM-3484 rubbed their arm. “What is she going to do about it? Who is she going to tell? The Captain?” They looked at Rey again. “Besides, she seems nice enough anyway. What does it matter if she knows I’m Lucky and you’re Threes.”

Threes gave Lucky another shove. “I guess it doesn’t matter anymore now that you’ve told her.”

“Threes and Lucky... I like them. Did you give each other nicknames or do you pick them out?”

The three of them continued walking down the long corridors of the Finalizer. It was easy to forget just how large the star destroyer really was, especially when you were confined to a single room most of the time.

“Lucky got his name because he’s lucky he hasn’t been set adrift in space for every time he breaks the rules,” said Threes.

Lucky looked over at Threes. “I thought it started after that time when you guys almost left me behind but I made it back just in the nick of time.”

Threes shook her head. “No, it started after sneezed during inspection with the General and we all thought the Captain was going to murder you.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t for all of my last-minute, life-saving heroics?”

Threes refused to look at him again. “It’s because you’re lucky I put up with you all the time.”

Rey was instantly amused by their bickering. She wondered if some part of her had convinced them to be more at ease around her. Could the Jedi manipulate people subtly like that? The thought made her uncomfortable. Would she have to always second guess herself and those around her? There was no way she could be so powerful yet, right? She pushed the thought out of her head. All she wanted to do was talk to someone, anyone, if life on this ship was to be her fate for the time being. A small part of her also knew, if she ever wanted to try to escape, having people on her side would be crucial.

“Well, I’m Rey, though I suppose you knew that.”

Lucky shakes his head. “I didn’t know you had a name, at least not one that they told us.”

“We were supposed to regard you as ‘the prisoner’ but I guess that’s a bit hopeless now.”

They finally reached a room that Rey had never seen before. Larger than most of the other ones she had been in. There were long tables, a place for stormtroopers to leave their helmets and bits of armor while they ate, and a place where they retrieved their rations. Not only that, there were people, lots of them, all waiting in line and sitting at tables. The strangeness of seeing a stormtrooper without their helmet on was multiplied for a moment as she took in all of these soldiers, diverse and distinct from each other now that she could see their faces. 

Lucky and Threes led her through their usual process for getting food and brought her to their table. Rey could feel eyes on her all the while. She knew she must have looked strange to them; clearly an outsider, a break in all of their uniformity. 

Her chest hurt a little when she thought of Finn sitting at one of these tables. In all likelihood, he would have. She wondered if any of them knew him during his time here. Some of them must have.

Threes introduced her to the other stormtroopers in their squadron. LM-6701, LM-3577, LM-1102, and LM-3590 were two men and two women. All of them seemed to distrust Rey initially, talking in low voices if at all. Rey found she was able to listen in any way and persevered in her effort to try to get to know them. 

She found that their squadron was almost a small family. They looked after each other and socialized mainly with one another. They performed the same sorts of jobs on the shift and out in the field. She suspected one or two of them might even have crushes on some of the other members. Part of her couldn’t help but see the more sinister side to their arrangement. The members of the squadron were responsible for keeping each other in check because if one of them was out of line, the whole group was put at risk. 

The squadrons were a way of getting the stormtroopers to regulate themselves. Rey could see General Hux’s fingerprints on this. She doubted, however, that he had foreseen another unintended result. The squadron grew closer to each other over time and grew more familiar with each other as individuals, people. They all had their own nicknames and personalities, things that separated them from others. When differences occurred despite everything the First Order did to repress them, the stormtroopers learned to take their propaganda with a grain of salt. It was a small thing, but everyone seemed to recognize something about it wasn’t entirely true.

She learned LM-6701, Spot, had a mole on his cheek that had been surgically removed because it made him too noticeable but had been injured in battle in a way that gave him a new more noticeable scar where the mole had been. He was older than most of the others but didn’t do much in the way of trying to lead the group.

LM-1102 or Double was more of the de facto leader. Even Lucky and Threes seemed to follow her lead. She wasn’t harsh or overbearing in her leadership as was expected out of most First Order leadership, but softer and more likely to listen than to lecture. Double didn’t say too much during their lunch together, preferring to listen and nod politely to the others’ conversation, all the while watching Rey.

She didn’t learn too much about the other two, LM-3577 and LM-3590. Neither of them seemed to have nicknames. The others simply referred to them as Seven-Seven and Nine-oh. They spoke to each other more than anything and kept quiet otherwise. It wasn’t until later in the conversation that she found them to be much more interesting.

Lucky, who really seemed to like Rey after all told her that the two of them had been recently transferred to their squadron from a different one. They had gone into battle with their former squadron and had lost several of their teammates. The rest of the squadron was divided up. They were lucky to have been assigned to another squadron rather than executed, Lucky told her, something very serious must have happened there but no one was supposed to talk about it. They were a part of the LM squadron now and they kept mostly to themselves. He suspected that they would warm up to the group eventually, but the last few days had been difficult.

“Wait, were they on Jakku?” asked Rey. She had asked Lucky because she hadn’t expected the two to answer, but they both turned to her at the mention of that desert planet.

“What do you know about it?” asked Seven-seven defensively. She spoke for her companion who now had tears in his eyes.

Rey tried to speak with compassion in her voice, but she was afraid her excitement diluted it. “I used to live there, I did live there up until I was captured. And I had a friend who fought in that battle for your side. Did you know Finn?”

“Stormtroopers do not interact with civilians,” interrupted Threes.

“No, he was a stormtrooper like you all. Um, FN-21…” She struggled to remember the digits of her friend's former serial code.

“Eight-seven?” asked Seven-seven. “Yeah, we knew him.” Nine-oh’s tears finally fell. “He was a really good... soldier.”

For the moment, Rey ignored the pause in Seven-seven's voice that spoke of something more. She pressed on. “Did you know about his escape?” asked Rey. She felt like singing. These people actually knew Finn. It didn’t necessarily mean they were sympathetic, but she was glad for any connection to the outside world.

“We weren’t told anything, but yeah, there were rumors that he had defected.”

“Well, it’s true. He has a name now, and friends, and he’s joined the Resistance,” said Rey, unable to control the words that were coming out of her mouth.

Double cleared her throat. “Threes, I think that’s enough.” She looked towards her second in command and Threes nodded. Lucky followed suit when she stood. The two of them looked down at Rey and expected her to come with them.

“What? Now?” asked Rey, refusing to believe that this connection to Finn could be lost so quickly.

“Time’s up,” said Threes.

Rey realized she had fooled herself into forgetting that she was sitting among soldiers. That, for all of their individual humanity, for all that they were real people with thoughts and feelings and names, they still had a job to do and she was still their prisoner.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, hello! I'm back. It's been a few weeks and I'm sorry, but I'm here now and back in action. (There was some writer's block, some stress, but I really do feel back in action)
> 
> I hope you enjoyed the latest chapter even though it was more plot-heavy than romance. However! That just means there will be some of that forthcoming (and very, very soon). 
> 
> Just a note, if you were someone looking forward to the next update of this fic, might I suggest letting me know on tumblr? That would be a really good way to ask me things like: Hey, when are you going to update this fic? What did you mean when you wrote...? What do you think about...? How hyped are you for The Last Jedi? How many more chapters will this fic be? etc.  
> It would also be a cool way for me to let interested parties know that I am still deeply invested in this fic which is about halfway complete and for me to say "Hey, I know it's been two weeks, but I am still writing!"
> 
> I felt a little guilty about the long wait but had no way of telling anyone. 
> 
> Anyway, sorry for the long author's note. Sorry for the wait. Sorry for continuing to apologize (I think I do that in every author's note, I should go back and check). It doesn't look like this story will be finished before The Last Jedi like I'd hoped, but I promise that this fic will stay spoiler free. It's all mapped out pretty well, I think even if there was something in there that could change my mind about something in here, I wouldn't do it. The next chapter will be up very soon, there was just something about this chapter that made it hard for me to get through. I think it all worked out well in the end though.
> 
> Thanks for reading so far and you are a saint if you are still reading this author's note. :)
> 
> PS: I decided this a little after I first posted the chapter. I have updated the chapter count! As of right now, this fic will be 13 chapters in total. We're more than halfway there! The next chapter will likely be up tomorrow so fingers crossed!


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An update in less than a week! That has to be a new record for me (at least in terms of this fic). The Last Jedi comes out in two days and I am freaking out.
> 
> Hope you enjoyed!

Her breath was heavy and rhythmic. Sweat flew from her forehead with each pounding. Her lips were parted in focus and exertion. She couldn’t believe how tiring this was. Her muscles burned but she was motivated by pleasure and adrenaline.

“You’re doing good,” said Phasma. “Really, really good.”

Rey breathed a laugh but didn’t stop. She tightened and twisted her core to lean into it with everything she had. She wanted Phasma to guide her hips the way she had done earlier, but the woman just watched with a smile on her face.

“You were so inexperienced. You’ve really come a long way.” She continued.

“Hard to believe I’d never thrown a punch before?” Rey laughed and threw one last blow at the punching bag.

As a welcome distraction from all of what happened earlier, Phasma had come to take her to her exercise. She hadn’t been sure that it was still going to happen after the added reward of being allowed to socialize. It was a relief when the Phasma had arrived at her door.

“I didn't say that. Your smallness is deceiving now. You don’t look like you could hurt a fly, but I would think twice before crossing you.”

“You would?” asked Rey, trying to quell the urge to feel giddy with pride.

“Well…” started Phasma, she ran her fingers through the back of her hair. “No, not me specifically.. but figuratively-”

“I want a rematch,” said Rey decisively. “Just like the first night only this time, I’m going to win.”

Phasma smirked, “So sure of yourself.”

Rey was already in the circle. “I’ve been practicing.” 

She wasn’t sure where this confidence was coming from. The last time she had fought with Phasma she had almost beaten Phasma the last time they’d fought. She had a sneaking suspicion that the woman had gone easy on her, at least a little. Perhaps it was the work she had been doing in using the force that made her fearless, but then, how was levitating a boot going to help her in the ring?

“Alright then.” 

They squared off in the ring, but this time Rey was anything but hesitant. She flew to Phasma’s side and landed a blow before Phasma knew what hit her. It didn’t take her long to react, but at that point, Rey was bobbing out of reach. 

Phasma shook her hair out of her eyes. “Okay then.” 

It was as though she had flipped a switch in her brain. She had been holding back almost entirely before. Rey’s newfound competence merited fewer holds barred. 

Something in Rey changed when she noticed this. It was instinct. Battle brought her quickly to the space her mind traveled to in meditation. She saw everything so clearly.

Phasma faked a punch to the left before swiping back with her elbow. The look on her face was priceless when the blow didn't connect. She spun and aimed a kick to the midsection that Rey danced away from. Phasma seemed surprised by Rey's new speed and agility. 

Rey’s mind was whirring. She didn’t focus on getting punches in, preferring to let Phasma tire herself in the effort. It felt like she knew exactly what moves Phasma was going to make before she made them and was able to frustrate her in avoiding them at the last second.

“I taught you how to punch, but all you want to do is run away?” Phasma said between breaths and calculated swings.

Rey ducked beneath a wild arm and escaped behind Phasma once more. “I’ve learned how to do more than punch,” she said, not out of breath in the slightest.

Phasma adapted to Rey’s tactics and slowly backed her towards the edge of the ring and towards being pinned against the wall. Rey had no doubts about what to do next. Knowing she was close to being trapped, she trusted in something within and outside of herself and threw herself into the air.

She shouldn’t have been able to jump that high. From a standing position, she leaped over Phasma and landed on her feet behind the astonished woman. She took the opportunity to push Phasma against the wall. In surprise, Phasma didn’t resist.

Her hands on Phasma’s bare shoulders relaxed slightly to allow Phasma to turn and face her. She looked at Rey with wide eyes filled with disbelief.

“How- how did you-?” She stuttered. Her face was completely open, devoid of any sort of pretense. Phasma wasn’t angry or determined, the look she usually got when they fought or the look she had only moments ago. Her face looked softer in awe. Something about it made Rey feel that same giddiness from before.

Rey couldn’t stop her smile. “I don’t know!” 

She stepped away from Phasma, suddenly feeling too close, but Phasma stepped towards her simultaneously and pulled her in. 

Rey couldn’t believe what was happening until Phasma’s lips were on hers and her eyes flickered closed.

It was impossible to say how long Rey had wished for this. Well, the exact amount of time could be traced to somewhere in the last few days. She had only known Phasma for a few days, so it wasn’t very long at all, but then there was the wish to be held like this, to be kissed like this and she had wanted this for as long as she could remember.

Neither of them was very experienced in kissing, but neither of them was dissatisfied. Rey wasn’t sure she ever wanted it to end. She always wanted Phasma’s hand on her waist and the heat of her breath on her face. 

Phasma broke the kiss first and saw the rosy blush high on Rey’s cheeks. Phasma wondered if her own face looked the same, it was certainly hot enough. Had Rey liked it? It was suddenly of the utmost importance to her that she had and it frustrated her, not being able to know instantly. She often found it a little hard to read the subtle emotions of other people. 

Slowly, it dawned on her that it didn’t matter. That broke her heart more than anything.

Phasma swallowed a shaky breath and a wave of several emotions. If Rey was using the force and was learning how to use it in combat… well, it likely meant the end of these training sessions. It meant the end of what little freedom Rey had gained so far and it meant that Phasma wasn’t going to see her again. 

There were stories of Jedi being able to read people’s minds. Phasma was pretty sure Kylo Ren could do it. She wondered if Rey knew what she was thinking right now.

All Rey could see was awe on Phasma’s face and she smiled at the sight of it. Then that awe and delight turned gray, from something unreadable to consternation to worry to sadness to… fear? 

Rey was thoroughly confused. She wanted to throw up and cry and run away and hit something all at once. She had felt one moment of real happiness and it had vanished so quickly. Why had Phasma kissed her, anyway? The First Order had been fairly humane so far, but she knew what evil they were capable of. Was this some trick to break her completely?

Rey didn’t run or hide or throw up. She was very close to crying, but she bit her lip, looked away, and didn’t say anything. It was so hard to turn away from Phasma and walk towards the door with head held high and hands at her sides. Phasma had let her return to her room alone before; she didn’t think Phasma would try to stop her from doing so tonight.

\--------  
Phasma didn’t sleep at all that night. Rey’s sudden burst of force sensitivity was a development she should have expected. Hindsight told her she should never have gotten invested in the girl at all. Logic, however, told her that not loving Rey was as impossible as taking a stroll into deep space.

Perhaps the only way she could have escaped this fate at all was if she had never spent time with Rey at all. Maybe these traitorous feelings were all Hux’s fault for suggesting she become closer to her. It hadn’t seemed like a dangerous proposition at the time. Now, she knew it had the potential to be fatal.

It was the first time in years that she had questioned protocol. She would expect any other soldier to report something like this to a superior. It shouldn't have even been a question. Her sleepless night told her that this was the last thing she wanted to do.

She hated it, this feeling of betrayal and self-doubt. All she wanted was to be able to confess this secret she now held. She wanted to march into the leadership council room in the morning and tell them that Rey was dangerous. She wanted to confess that she knew Rey was teaching herself to use the force. She needed to explain that if Rey wasn’t confined to her room for the rest of the trip they risked her escape.

There was no way she could, though. It was pointless to even consider it and yet she did for hours and hours. As the morning meeting drew closer, she could only hope no one noticed her bloodshot eyes.

She paused during her morning meal over a comm she’d received sometime during the night. It stated that the regular morning meeting would be delayed two hours and moved to a new location. The comm had come directly from Hux. It was highly unusual. She sent out a few messages of her own to ensure that it had no effect on her other responsibilities. This had the potential to be something big.

When she entered the room for the delayed morning meeting, some of Phasma’s worries were put to rest. She didn’t have to worry about hiding her eyes and demeanor from the other officers at the conference table. Most of them either respected her too much to look at her sideways or felt that stormtrooper development was too far beneath their station. The only person she would have to fool would be Hux and she wasn’t looking forward to it.

Hux made his entrance after everyone had assembled. It soon became clear that she wouldn’t have to convince anyone of her well-being. He entered with his attire pristine as always, hair gelled neatly into place, but one look at his face told different story. There was a wild concern in his features that Phasma hadn’t seen since Starkiller. She had rather hoped to never see it again.

He started in slowly, as though unsure what to say. Everyone in the room was frightened by his demeanor and hung on every word of what came next. “At three hundred hours we received a brief communication from an encrypted sender. I was notified at once by Major Karlitt and we have verified that it was sent by the Resistance.”

A larger crowd might have erupted into gasps and chatter. The officers were silent; eyes wide but otherwise stone-faced.

“The message was brief.” He tapped on the screen in front of him. Instantly each screen in front of an officer lit with a transcript of the message:

‘We want Rey. We are willing to negotiate. Let us speak with her at ten hundred hours.’

The message was straightforward and somehow terrifying. The Resistance shouldn’t have been able to contact them. They could only suspect that they had Rey in custody, why would they risk revealing themselves?

“We have technicians working on tracing the source of this message, but I suspect that such a search will not produce anything of value. As of now, we should expect to receive a holo from the Resistance any minute now.”

Everyone looked to see what time it was. Only five minutes remained until the virtual rendezvous. 

“It’s really them?” asked Lieutenant Mitaka, who had taken the place of a deceased Major Tolm. 

Hux would never have answered a question with so obvious an answer, but with a deep breath, this time he did. “Yes, it is.”

“So where is the girl?” asked another officer, a woman with short, fuzzy hair. 

Another officer spoke before Hux. “Are you insane? They aren’t even sure that we have her. She could be dead for all they know.”

“But they say they’re willing to negotiate. Why would we throw away that leverage?”

An older voice joined in. “It’s more to our advantage if we can turn her over to our side. Nothing the Resistance can offer us is as valuable as that.”

Hux stayed silent as the officers at the table quarreled. He caught Phasma’s eye and raised an eyebrow at her lack of participation. She wasn’t normally one to participate in nonsense like this, which happened far too regularly. Today, she found she had an opinion on the subject. 

“We should let her speak to them.”

All eyes turned to look at her. So much for keeping a low profile. “If they know she’s alive we can determine what they’re willing to give up in exchange and-” She turned to the older man whom she knew would start to argue. “If the Resistance knows that she’s alive they may attempt a rescue mission, drawing them out of their new hiding spot and into conflict where they’ll be vulnerable.”

Most people looked impressed by this line of reasoning, but it was not without question. “Aren’t we vulnerable? The Finalizer doesn’t even have a working hyperdrive.”

“We are close to making full repairs,” said Hux, at last. “We are still a few days out from the Supreme Leader’s coordinates and attaining the last few parts necessary for completion. We believe that although the Resistance was able to contact us, they were only able to detect a communication frequency. They are still approximately four days away from determining the source of those detected transmissions. By then the ship will be prepared and we can afford to make a stand.”

Everyone was silent. Hux added, “The timing of this has been so short notice that we are unable to consult the Supreme Leader for his orders, but I believe this is the best course of action. Thus, I sent for the girl five minutes ago and-” He tapped on his datapad again and the door to the meeting room opened. “Here she is now.”

Rey left her stormtrooper escorts in the hall and entered the room. She stared straight ahead at Hux, looking at no one else in the room especially not Phasma. Her face lacked all expression and Phasma felt proud of her strength. Then she looked at Rey’s wrists, lacking any form of force-suppressing cuffs and felt a surge of fear and guilt.

Hux indicated for her to sit in a chair behind him and Rey stood stubbornly in front of it. 

All at once, every screen turned red with a message that said: incoming holo. Hux straightened and accepted the call. In the center of the table, was a two-foot tall figure of a man. Rey recognized him instantly.

“Finn!” she shouted. Hux closed his eyes, not anticipating that Rey would interrupt his carefully planned negotiating tactics.

“Rey?” asked Finn, leaning in closer to an invisible camera.

“FN-2187,” said Hux, ending their almost reunion. “I have to admit, when I learned I would be negotiating with the Resistance this morning, I did not anticipate speaking with you.”

In the background, hardly audible they could hear someone yell, “He doesn’t like talking to you either, Red!”

“Poe-” Finn started, before reminding himself what he was doing. “I’ve been appointed the representative of the Resistance to negotiate the return of Rey.” 

Phasma cracked the bones in her neck. She knew that FN-2187 couldn’t see her, but she hoped he could feel from systems away, the hatred she was channeling towards his figure on the desk.

“As you can see, we have the girl. What are you willing to offer in this prisoner exchange?” asked Hux.

“Well…” It appeared Finn hadn’t been given directives this far in. The Resistance hadn’t determined what they were willing to sacrifice for Rey’s return just yet. Finn turned and took a piece of flimsi from the air. He read it and his mouth hung open.

“What?!” he asked someone behind him. “We can’t just- Why would we-?”

His image flickered out and moments later a comm came in similar to the one they had received earlier:

‘We will not negotiate for the return of Rey. We will allow you to keep her. We will allow you temporary further reign in the outer rim. We will allow you to build another superweapon. In exchange, we will take Kylo Ren as captive. Those are our demands.’

Everyone was silent. Rey’s eyes were wide as she read the message. Her lips parted in disbelief. They were abandoning her? In exchange for Kylo Ren?

Hux smiled and shook his head, amused. “Well, that is one deal we shall not be making. I find it hard to believe they would be so bold. They can’t believe that we would ever accept such ridiculous terms.” 

He laughed and a few nervous chuckles echoed around the room. Hux turned to Rey. “Don’t worry, dear. I’m sure they don’t really mean it. They want you back more than ever, but they were never going to negotiate for your return.” Turning back to the table he continued, “We shall proceed as planned. Prepare for arrival in the coming days. Get all stations prepared for battle. Make sure the hyperdrive is prepared aside from the needed parts. Get Kylo Ren and Rey down to the planet. We proceed as planned and get ready for an imminent rescue attempt.”

Rey’s face held no emotion in it any longer. Phasma thought she looked almost broken. Her emotions had been on a shuttle in the last few minutes, blasting off into elation and plummeting towards the ground in despair. The stormtroopers who accompanied her to the meeting entered and removed her from the room. She did not object.

The negotiation had been a gambit. There was nothing the Resistance was really willing to give up in order to enable Rey’s return, but they ventured a shot in the dark to gain a something they deemed a more valuable advantage. All they really wanted was to know that Rey was still alive and in First Order custody. There was no risk involved. They would come for Rey regardless.

Still, the look in Rey’s eyes would be enough to make anyone reconsider that tactic.

“You have your orders,” said Hux. “Dismissed.”

Phasma, despite her best efforts, was one of the last to leave the room. 

“Phasma, are you feeling alright?” asked Hux.

She had thought, with all of the commotion and the latest developments, he wouldn’t have noticed the pain she was keeping bottled up. 

“I’m fine,” she said and Hux shrugged it off. Perhaps he hadn’t noticed at all; merely suspecting something might be off and then determining that there wasn’t. He had no reason to suspect that she had lied.

There was nothing worse than feeling like she just wanted to go to sleep and knowing that she had to face the rest of her day. No one besides Hux would even consider the idea that something might be wrong with her. She would know though, and just like she hadn’t been able to think of anything else all night, today would be no different. 

She wanted to seek comfort in Rey. The girl was a light in all her darkness, but Phasma wondered if Rey would ever look at her again. Rey ignored her completely and had walked out after their kiss last night. Phasma felt she was probably at fault for why she left, but couldn’t be entirely sure. 

Perhaps Rey thought Phasma hadn’t liked it. Perhaps Rey hated Phasma for kissing her. Perhaps Rey had read her mind and thought Phasma would betray her. 

It was probably her fault, she realized. Could their relationship, even the friendship Phasma realized she treasured, ever return to what it had been? 

Phasma needed to do something about it. She would see Rey tonight. She would make things right.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A beginning author's note this time:  
> 1) No TLJ spoilers in this chapter or in the rest of the fic  
> 2) This chapter has been a long time coming and I'm a little nervous  
> 3) Enjoy!

Phasma had not been asked to train with Rey that night. In fact, she had been expressly told not to. Rey was to be punished for her actions at the meeting.

Boots clicked softly along the hall, trying not to be heard. Phasma was going to see Rey anyway. It didn’t matter if they trained or not. 

The guard outside the door did not let her in immediately. She had come without her helmet and infamous armor, as she usually did when she came to collect Rey, but as a result, the stormtrooper unwittingly questioned his far superior officer. He was aware that Rey wasn’t allowed to leave for training. Once it became clear to him exactly who he was speaking to, he knew better than to question a superior officer. Phasma told him to leave and he obeyed swiftly with a salute.

The room was dark, but she could see Rey curled into a corner of her bed. Her figure reminded Phasma of how she looked when they first met, impossibly small with delicate curves, but full of something that made her seem vibrant and full. She lay with her back facing the door, huddled within herself. 

Phasma entered without waiting for an invitation. There was little chance that Rey hadn’t noticed her enter, but she didn’t respond initially. Cautiously, Phasma perched on the edge of the bed. Rey seemed to be asleep, but Phasma felt she knew her too well to fall for that. There was no way her whole being wasn’t finely attuned to notice every time the door opened. 

“I came to talk,” she started. “about last night.”

“Fine.” The girl answered, knowing who was there without looking behind. “Talk.”

Phasma wasn't sure how to say what she was about to say to the back of Rey’s head. She sighed and gave it a shot.

“Last night… we kissed and it was absolutely amazing,” She licked her lips subconsciously trying to taste Rey. She continued. “And I want that to happen again. If you do, I mean.” 

Rey didn't respond. Phasma soldiered on.

“I really like you Rey, but I realize now that I’m also terrified. Completely terrified.”

“What?” asked Rey, rolling over to face her at last. 

“You used the force last night and- and you proved that you are more dangerous than anyone knows. Dangerous to the First Order, to the galaxy, to me…”

“I would never hurt you,” blurted Rey, before adding, “I wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

Phasma couldn't help her hand reaching out to Rey’s hip, drawing her a little closer. It was a consoling gesture and something she had been wanting to do since she first saw her. 

“I think Kylo Ren’s face would say differently…” she said, hoping to earn a laugh. Rey gave a half smile. 

“He deserved it,” said Rey.

“Well, I think the General likes the new scar, very rugged,” said Phasma before turning serious again and overcoming some of the nerves that were telling her to continue prattling nonsense. “That wasn't what I meant by dangerous.”

“What did you mean?” 

“You make me question things. Myself, mostly, but… with you around I find myself acting in my own self-interest. I find that I have a self-interest, one that supersedes all sense of duty that otherwise rules my life. I find myself here, going against orders because I care about you, Rey, and that is a very dangerous thing.”

Rey stared up at her with wide eyes. She sat up, realizing her position was ridiculous and shifted Phasma's hand to the small of her back.

“Does it have to be?” Rey reached out too, her hand on Phasma’s knee.

Phasma was at a loss. On the surface, it seemed to be facetious, but for a moment Phasma let herself imagine a galaxy in which they could be together unencumbered. It was just a fantasy.

“I don't see any other way,” she answered.

“Why do you fight for the Order?” asked Rey.

“This isn't what I wanted to talk about.” 

Rey was deadly serious. “You brought it up and it's what I want to talk about.”

“How did I bring it up?”

“You said there was no way we could end up safe together, and while the part about being safe is probably true, why couldn't you defect to the Rebellion?”

Phasma should have been outraged. She was proposing treason, but the only thing Phasma felt was deep self-loathing.

“There- I… I was born in the outer rim.” she started, wanting to do her question justice. “It was probably similar in some ways to your life on Jakku. There was no contact with the rest of the galaxy. We lived like savages, fighting for resources and power. My life was hard, ruthless and unforgiving. Then the First Order came and they offered me a way out. I was the best fighter they had ever seen who came from some awful god-forsaken wasteland of a planet. They gave me the chance to be more than the terrible place I came from. I had never even seen a starship before they arrived. Through them, I’ve seen the galaxy and I know the truth of it now. The Republic is weak and ineffective. It cannot do all that it wants to because it lacks power. The First Order is about power.”

There was a moment there when Rey wondered if it really was Phasma speaking. The words seemed to come from someone else's mouth.

“I serve the Order because they do what is needed to be done to help the majority. It's a way of demanding and becoming the change I want to see in the galaxy.”

Now Rey wished she'd taken Phasma's advice and stayed away from the topic.

“I don't believe that fascism is the answer.”

“I’m not asking you to agree with me.” she countered.

“You wouldn't leave, even if it meant a better life?” A life with me, she meant.

“I don't know,” said Phasma. “It seems I have a tenuous grip on who I am at the moment. I can't speak to the future.”

“Can we talk about right now?” asked Rey who reached up to Phasma's face with on hand and traced her smooth jawbone with a few fingers. Her skin was so smooth. She knew it was usually covered by her helmet. How terrible it would be to never see this face.

Phasma inclined her head and Rey’s hand slid the rest of the way down her graceful neck. It gave her an idea. Hesitantly at first, Rey leaned in to kiss the soft skin under her chin. She planted a garden of kisses trailed along her throat before Phasma reached up to lift those lips to her own. 

It was like being shown how to stretch again. She followed Phasma’s lead and soon Rey was gasping. There was no way to take in Phasma fast enough, the beauty and sweetness of her. She wanted to know every inch of her, but it felt like she was running out of time.

Phasma coiled her hands in Rey's hair. Those hands twisted and scratched, making Rey gasp against Phasma's lips. 

By her own instinct or perhaps prompted by Phasma's desires, Rey lifted Phasma's shirt over her head and Phasma was only too happy to comply. 

The shirt fell unceremoniously to the floor and it was soon joined by another. A bra dangled from the edge of the bed. Phasma's hands struggled with the clasp on Rey's back. She laughed at Rey when she threw it off over her head like a shirt. 

Rey was petrified for a moment, suddenly exposed to this much skin. She reached out with both hands to just touch Phasma's broad shoulders. Even that was so much all at once. Over the past few days, she had slowly gotten to see more of Phasma and now she was right there in front of her all at once. The blonde looked her in the eyes, a hunger in her gaze, and Rey drew her gaze up. Her heart was racing in her chest.

Phasma guided one of Rey’s hands to her breast. It was impossible to know where to look. She had been overwhelmed by kissing before, now there was so much of her to kiss and touch and bite and caress. Her heartbeat echoed loudly in her ears. She was already sweating. Rey fell into another kiss.

They started fiercely because it felt like there was never going to be another time or place in the universe where this could happen again. The stars had aligned to give them this moment; an eclipse that could only last for a short time. 

Her hands explored the smooth skin of Phasma’s back, soft and pale like moonlight. Cold armor hid this from everyone else. She had taken it off only ever for her. Rey supposed that was why Phasma wore the armor. No one saw the rosy blush to her cheeks, the gentle roundness to her features that no amount of suffering and training could remove. 

Phasma gripped Rey’s hair for leverage. It was a tug and light scratch that reminded Rey of someone doing her hair. She had liked that once, however long ago it had been since someone had gotten this close to her. Maybe it was even a reminder of her parents, whoever they had been. Every touch bordered on just too much. It must have been ages since she had held another person this tightly. She had never wanted to know someone so deeply.

Soon, Rey was lying on her back, with her pants kicked off and on the floor. 

“You really want this?” asked Phasma kneeling over her. She traced circles along Rey’s hips that shivers down her back. 

“Yes,” she said, simply. 

Slowly, Phasma moved one hand farther down, between her legs. Her touch was light and nowhere near enough. The gentleness of it teased her still racing heart and the slick between her thighs.

Her fingers stroked lazily. There was love and tenderness in every movement. Every time she got close to it Rey bit her lip, and Phasma teased her a little more.

“You like that?” Phasma asked, working her fingers along, one occasionally venturing deeper.

“Mmhmm.” murmured Rey, afraid to open her mouth to keep herself from growing too vocal. “More,” she whispered.

“Greedy are we?” She dipped a finger inside and Rey arched her back. 

“Please…” Rey sat up to kiss Phasma. It was a sweet thing, a wordless thank you still pleading for more. 

Phasma smiled. “Since you asked so nicely.”

Phasma lowered Rey’s legs to the sheets and knelt between them. She leaned in low over the bed as though either in prayer or ready to pounce. She sent a smile up at Rey, who was dying to touch herself and kissed her between the legs.

Rey felt herself go weak. Phasma began stroking her like before, but with her tongue lapping up the taste of her. Phasma moved in with her fingers and Rey gripped the sheets. She breathed a sigh that might have started out as a word. Yes, good, right there, ah. 

Part of this was simple instinct. Rey had never done this before, she was sure that Phasma hadn’t either, but they had touched themselves before even if they had never been touched by another. Rey was leading Phasma through her unexplored terrain, holding her hand as they ran along the paths she knew so well. Of course, she had thought of what this might be like with another person, someone she cared about. She had never imagined it would be like this.

Phasma looked quite like an angel between her thighs. Her blond hair looked quite like a halo all mussed and shining in the light. The sight made Rey close her eyes. She heard a low moan in her throat and it barely escaped her lips.

The fingers flirted with her clitoris before Phasma took a long swipe with her tongue. Rey hardly felt it when she let out a shout. She felt a pounding in her head before everything went white.

Phasma stopped what she was doing and when Rey recovered, panting and moaning. At last, she pulled Phasma down to lie beside her. Her lips refused to form words so she kissed Phasma slowly to soothe her racing heart.

It was sweet and slow, more powerful and deep than the last. Rey’s hands went to Phasma’s short blonde hair. They massaged instead of scratching and pulling like before. She didn’t need to use the force to tell that Phasma liked that.

Her hand slipped down and Rey did her best to mimic what Phasma had done for her. Rey tipped Phasma onto her back and tried not to notice the amused grin on her face. She might not have tremendous experience, but she was ready to prove herself.

She worked with just her hands. Something told her that if she tried to do what Phasma had done to her, that magic with her mouth and tongue, she would leave both of them dissatisfied.

So she traced circles, slow at first but growing ever quicker. The space between her legs was ready for Rey to begin. It was so tempting to taste it because she knew how good that had felt for her. Instead, she increased the speed of her hand and let the other sink into Phasma.

After warming up on Rey, Phasma let her defenses fall. There was no space left in her head for anything but Rey. Why should she put on some form of the guise she put on for everyone else? Why should she be anyone other than someone in love with Rey in this moment?

Rey looked up to see Phasma’s head knocked back. Her lips opened with each hitching breath. Phasma’s knees gathered up around her shoulders when she rolled her hips against Rey’s hands. It was easy to see that Phasma was so, so close and that was when she went in to kiss her.

That was the end of it for Phasma. Rey nearly felt the shock of it herself. When they laid down side by side on a bed barely big enough for one, Rey felt the closest thing to happiness she had known in a very long time.

“I can’t believe you,” said Phasma. “You are amazing.”

“I was that good?” she tried to sound smug but was honestly surprised.

Phasma rolled to her side. “You were fine. It’s just… you never fail to impress me.”

Rey mirrored her and they lay facing each other. 

“I feel like I know all about you and yet you are never exactly the way I expect,” she added.

They lay there in silence, sweaty and wet. Both of them messes in every sense of the word. Undone like this, they were beautiful in each other’s eyes. It was impossible to keep from smiling. They didn’t touch or kiss. They just lay there looking at each other, drinking in this moment that felt like an eternity but would soon be over. Nothing about this was close to permanent, but lying there felt as though things could be like this forever.

Rey was the first to break the silence. Her voice seemed loud, though it could hardly have been more than a whisper. “I’ve been realizing… that I don’t know very much at all about you,” she said. “...but I want to. I want to know everything.” Their foreheads met and they whispered to each other.

“Everything? I don’t think there’s that much to tell.”

“Where were you born? Did you have a family? Have you always been drawn to power-driven egomaniacs?” asked Rey with a laugh. “I know you’re a soldier, and you’re focused and strong. I know that you care for the people you lead and like skinny scavenger girls. What am I missing here?”

Phasma gave a small smile. She was tempted to say ‘not much’, but stopped herself. There really was a large disconnect in how well Rey knew her. There was a power imbalance in their relationship that shifted and churned from the beginning. There was little that Phasma didn't know about Rey, but in some ways, Phasma might as well still be a stormtrooper in a mask to Rey. What could have drawn Rey to her? How could her feelings have been reciprocated so easily, when Rey hardly knew anything about her, about what she'd done. She supposed it wouldn’t hurt to start from the beginning. “I grew up on a small planet in the Outer Rim, Parnassos. I wouldn’t be surprised if you hadn’t heard of it. It’s a terrible place.”

“Did you have a family? A life there?” said Rey, trying not to get too excited and she startle Phasma into closing up again. 

“Yes,” Phasma answered hesitantly. “To both questions, but not anymore.” 

Rey wasn’t sure how far she should push Phasma. She wanted the other woman to open up to her, but somethings can’t be said. Phasma’s answer was short, but there was a chance she was still willing to answer questions. “What was it like?” 

“I wouldn’t have called us primitive at the time, but that’s exactly what we were. I lived in a tribe. We fought and did the best we could to survive. I think the planet was once habitable, but mining left it almost completely inhospitable. We were the last humans on a planet that tried a little harder every day to kill us.”

“And your family?”

“They’re dead now.” There was no emotion in Phasma’s voice, not pain or grief or even pleasure, on the opposite end of the spectrum. Her eyes had gone off into the distance somewhere.

“I’m sorry,” said Rey. Maybe now wasn’t the best time for this conversation.

Phasma looked down for a moment. “Joining the First Order was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. “I haven’t looked back since.”

“Never?”

“Sometimes,” she admitted, but those instances happened less and less now. It had been a long time since she had last thought of where she came from or her family. 

“Not all stormtroopers choose to leave their homes, their families.” It wasn’t a question.

“No, sometimes their families give them up.”

“Do you think it could happen, that they’re just… taken?” Rey yawned and Phasma wondered how much time had escaped them. 

“Are you thinking… Finn?” It was hard for her to say the name she had given the traitorous stormtrooper, but she hoped Rey hadn’t noticed her hesitation. Phasma hated that the thought of that rebel scum could have crossed her mind at a time like this. After everything they had just done? Hadn’t this been the start of something more? Hadn’t this told her that they could be okay after all?

No, Phasma had deluded herself once again. This was temporary. Her happiness was fleeting. She had been foolish to think otherwise. She thought, for the first time in years, of life on Parnassos. Every day had been a fight. Since joining the Order, she thought she had moved past that way of life. Now she realized it hadn’t, not for one minute. She had suffered for everything she had now, just as she had back then. The happiness she had felt was not so easily won, she would have to fight for it.

Rey didn’t say anything. Her eyelids had been slowly drifting to a close and now they were resolutely shut. Only when Phasma woke the next morning did she realize just how tired she had been too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you liked it! Please, please, please let me know what you thought! The Last Jedi inspired me to get this chapter out sooner. I think this makes three chapters in a week and a half/ two weeks?


	11. Chapter 11

Phasma hadn’t meant to stay the night in Rey’s bed. She had entirely forgotten where she was by the time her eyes opened and nearly woke the sleeping woman next to her in surprise. Her initial panic was soothed when she looked over at Rey still sleeping beside her, and the open peacefulness on her face. 

She resisted the urge to brush the few locks of hair that had fallen across Rey’s face as she slept. Phasma held back, feeling as though she would ruin everything about this beautiful, quiet moment if she made even one move. Even this felt like more than she deserved. She imagined lying here for ages, letting some stormtrooper find her curled around Rey in bed. Where had she gotten such a silly idea from?

Tentatively, she tried to edge herself out of bed without waking Rey up. They slept curved in towards each other, as though they had spent the night whispering secrets like little girls, though in a sense they had. Phasma’s back was pressed against the wall which made leaving with any sort of stealth an impossible task. Rey’s eyes flickered open the moment she started to move.

When she realized that there was a new guard stationed outside Rey’s room, Phasma resigned herself to the worst possible humiliation. Then, Rey came up behind her. She kissed Phasma’s cheek and turned to face the door. She closed her eyes and the space between her eyebrows crinkled. 

Phasma stepped back when the door slid open. Sure enough, a stormtrooper was waiting on the other side. She turned to Rey whose eyes were still closed. Rey lifted a hand and the stormtrooper stepped aside allowing Phasma to pass.

With a second, less than chaste kiss, Phasma nearly ran from the room. She had no idea what time it was and could only hope that she wasn’t late. Her room wasn’t far away, and she made record time in getting dressed. Only after she was completely presentable did she check the time. She had a full hour to spare. Extremely relieved, she went to the mess hall to have the breakfast she’d planned on going without.

Today would be the second meeting in a row in which Phasma desperately hoped no one looked at her too closely. She had great success with that endeavor yesterday and hoped her luck would hold today. 

She had been a bit frightened by Rey’s use of the force in the last few moments of their time together. It’s innately terrifying to see someone behave against their own will. There was no way she could ever be terrified of Rey though. The thought of her ever using that power in a nefarious way was nearly inconceivable. She had heard stories of Kylo Ren using it against others. Subordinates came back babbling about phantom hands and being choked within an inch of their lives. Rey didn’t have that kind of anger and despite her skill, she was still just a beginner. Phasma wished her train of thought had ended before the last part. It did not leave her with any sort of comfort.

Phasma made it to the meeting room with time to spare but found General Hux already at the head of the table. This did not bode well. 

“We have no time to waste today.” It hadn’t felt like any of their previous meetings had wasted time, quite the opposite, but his sharp tone said that their circumstances were now even more serious. 

They went over the exact numbers and timetables for landing, battlements, and supplies. All stormtrooper and TIE units were ready for battle at a moment’s notice. All radar technicians were scanning for ships coming out of hyperspace. There was no telling when the Resistance would strike, but it was a certainty that they would.

The Finalizer would reach its destination in three days, two days ahead of the initial estimate. They assumed the Resistance would plan their attack before they arrived. It would be easier for the Resistance to attack a stationary target, some officers threw out the idea that the Resistance would wait until they had reached Snoke to stage their attempt. Hux dismissed that idea, insisting that the Resistance would assume their chances of intercepting Rey would be considerably less once Rey had reached Snoke. They held firm to the idea that Rey would remain the target of any sort of attack. The Resistance was nowhere near ready for a full-scale assault so soon after Starkiller.

There wasn’t much for Phasma to consider during this meeting, important as it was. Once the details of troop deployment in preparation for battle were dealt with, the focus of the meeting turned to plans for Kylo Ren and Rey to meet with the Supreme Leader and the status of the First Order’s current resources. 

Kylo Ren and Rey would make their descent to the planet’s surface alone and in three days. Someone questioned whether it was wise to let Rey travel without guards, but most seemed to agree that her current level of powers did not warrant such measures. Though Kylo Ren had failed on Starkiller to subdue the girl, there were few doubts that he would succeed if she tried anything again.

The Supreme Leader had not explicitly stated how long they would stay. Hux presumed that further orders would be given once the two force users arrived. Until then, they worked under the premise that the Finalizer was to remain in orbit around the planet and wait for their return.

Phasma wondered if Hux was worried. It was almost always impossible to tell, but recently, more and more emotion managed to find its way to the surface. Today he was the most composed he had been in over a week, but after having seen Hux in a state of panic, she wondered what was present even now under his facade. 

He dismissed the officers after an hour with everything appearing well in hand. The sense of urgency he instilled in them guided them towards efficiency rather than crisis, and Phasma was impressed by this subtle coercion. 

“Phasma,” called Hux as she was about to leave. It was the second day in a row he’d done so, and Phasma knew instantly that her luck in avoiding notice had just run out.

“The stormtrooper guarding the prisoner, Rey’s, room last night came back from his post early citing an order from you as his permission to leave. Now, you have the authority to issue commands to stormtroopers, but you did not have the authority to dismiss him as he was under orders from me.” He didn’t even ask a question but expected Phasma to rush to explain. 

Without the helmet to hide her face, she felt her ears go red. “Sir, I have an explanation,” she began, without really having one but hoping she would come up with one along the way. There was no excuse for such a breach of conduct and if Hux knew why she had done it... and what they had done afterward…

“There is no need,” he said simply and Phasma wasn’t sure whether to be elated or terrified. “You were acting under orders from me. I merely wanted to know how it went.”

Phasma felt her cheeks heat up and tried to keep her eyebrows from raising in astonishment. “Sir?” she asked.

Hux gave her a small smile and Phasma began to edge towards frightened rather than happy. “I asked you, weeks ago, when I first suspected you of having an interest in the girl to keep an eye on her, become close to her if you could. I permitted you to have daily meetings with her and I hoped that something would come of it. Can you confirm that something has?”

It didn’t sound as though he suspected that she and Rey had performed sexual acts with one another. At least, she hoped that smug look on his face wasn’t his typical reaction to lesbian sex. “Yes, sir. I believe it has. The girl has developed a trust in me that she has with no one else.”

“I never doubted you,” he said. “I expect a detailed report if she says anything of importance. Otherwise, you have my permission to continue.” 

Phasma took that to mean she was excused. 

Despite how hideous she felt inside, Phasma carried on with the work she needed to do.There were inspections to perform and exercises to put the different squadrons through. Most of this was routine, something that still felt comical to Phasma when to her everything had changed. 

She received a communication around midday that she had not seen in a while. Kylo Ren had a habit of asking her to spar with him whenever they found themselves on board the ship at the same time. It was kind of a tradition, but one she hadn’t expected him to act on so soon. 

Phasma did not want to meet him. Usually, she looked forward to their bouts. Kylo Ren was a challenge she did not get to face normally. Most of the time he fought without the use of the force and with a weapon other than his famous lightsaber. He did this to even the playing field, but Phasma often yelled at him not to hold back on her. These fights didn’t make them friends just… closer than either of them were to most people.

The first time they had met to spar had been an accident. Kylo Ren had not reserved the officer’s training room and Phasma walked in at the end of her shift. She was still wearing her helmet and armor when she found him practicing the basic saber forms. He seemed to be in some kind of deep trance and hardly noticed her. Then something in him changed and he snapped into action. He spun his weapon in his hand and launched himself at the three practice droids around him. Phasma felt he must have messed with the droids’ programming. They weren’t supposed to move like that, a little too fast and a bit better than usual with a sword. Still, he ducked and sliced. Phasma knew just from looking that with two hands on his weapon the impact would hurt. In the midst of his frenzy, Kylo Ren looked calm as if this were all just a game. She supposed it was. 

He left the droids sparking on the ground, not the typical end to a training session. Breathing in and out slowly through his mouth, he looked up at Phasma. He knew she was there. It felt as though he was looking directly at her, despite the mask she hid behind. 

In their sessions that followed, she didn’t wear the mask around him. He told her he could see beneath it or had a good sense of what she looked like without it and that it was silly to keep it on around him. Phasma got the sense that he understood why she wore it and was almost sad to tell her it was useless on him. Phasma hated that about him. He seemed to pity her for wearing the armor that made her stronger and for his inability to realize that he was exactly the same. 

She took the helmet off and for a while it was a small piece of freedom in a way, to let someone, almost a stranger know what she looked like. It felt dangerous and a little reckless, though she knew it could mean her no harm, to let Kylo Ren know what she looked like. Before Rey, he and General Hux were the only two people alive who knew.

Phasma couldn’t decline the request. She would have to face him eventually and to tell him she would not meet with him today would be suspicious. Phasma took a breath. Everything had to seem normal. Nothing had changed. She would meet Kylo Ren tonight and hope that he didn’t snoop through her mind like he always did.

After spending time with Kylo Ren, she wondered how the General put up with him. He had a way of talking as though everything about you was a well-known fact. There were no secrets you could keep from him. He could read you as easy as breathing. 

When Kylo Ren found out about Parnassos, he smiled. The time he found out about what she and Hux had done to Brendol, he had cut their session short. He insisted he didn’t go looking around in people’s minds. Without being uniquely attuned to the force and the ways of the universe, most people project their thoughts. Especially secrets, Kylo had said, secrets are the loudest of all.

She tried not to think of Rey’s abilities as a secret she was keeping from anyone. Everyone knew she had the force, that was why she was in this mess to begin with. Despite her growing powers, Rey hadn’t attempted a second escape. Surely that meant she was no longer a threat. 

Their relationship was something not everyone was aware of, but Hux knew and surely that was the most important part. Phasma dreaded letting Kylo Ren know how intimate she and Rey had become. Their relationship had always had a level of professionalism to it, enforced by Phasma’s insistence on keeping everyone at a distance. They weren’t friends and Phasma felt she put herself and Rey in danger if he knew of their feelings. She didn’t have any way of proving it, but it felt innately true. Perhaps it was rooted in finding Rey after she had encountered Ren in the hall. The girl had been terrified, likely with good reason.

Phasma didn’t pretend to understand the force, but she knew a threat when she saw one.

Since their first sparring, Kylo Ren had learned how to reserve a private training room. He was there waiting for Phasma when she arrived. She tried not to stare at the scar that now arched across his face.

Phasma took off her helmet and armor before starting to stretch as she always did. Things would go normally for her tonight only if she could pull herself together. She could do this. 

She moved over to a weapons rack and selected one of her favorites: a long metal staff, similar to one she kept back in her quarters. It had a certain weight to it that she liked. Almost none of the stormtroopers were used such a weapon, most of them lacking the height and strength to wield it.

“That thing again?” asked Kylo Ren, speaking to her at last. He seemed amused by the flashy weapon that had become a staple of their sessions.

“You’re one to talk about having favorites,” retorted Phasma. She referred of course to the lightsaber always attached to his belt whether or not he was in a position to use it. 

She twirled the staff in her hands. It felt good. Everything else she had done to try to regain any sense of normalcy had been futile, but this, this was what she knew. A weapon in hand was always where she felt most comfortable. Phasma let out a slow breath in pure relief.

“You seem off tonight.” Phasma had thought Kylo Ren had been performing his own preparations. In truth, he had been watching her, perhaps not with his eyes but in the way that he could see anyone around him through the force. Maybe he had heard her sigh or felt the relief she hadn’t known she’d been looking for. She tried not to curse herself internally.

“I’m fine.” Phasma wasn’t sure if this was a lie anymore.

They faced off in the ring. It all felt familiar and a bit different. The weight of the spear in her hand was the same so the rest of it didn’t seem to matter. 

“Same rules?” asked Kylo. He had a roguish bravado that peeked out of his stilted exterior at the strangest moments. 

Phasma eased out the cracks in her neck. “Hold back all you want. I don’t care, but if you choke me with the force, prepare to die.”

That was the extent of their relationship. It was as friendly as a few boastful remarks before a duel, but it was exactly the sort of friendship they had both needed once. Maybe they still did.

They didn’t do anything slowly. This was an all out, knock-down-drag-out sort of fight between two highly skilled opponents. Kylo embellished his fighting with spins and Phasma insisted on keeping him honest. He loved to show off and Phasma liked to make him pay for it. 

With her staff, she matched him blow for blow. Each hit sounded with a high metallic clang. It was a dance of sorts, a game with weapons that, while blunted, could still injure. Phasma caught one of his ferocious two-handed blows with two hands on her spear. Her knees refused to buckle. Before he could parry, Phasma kicked him in the stomach.

The kick connected bodily. Kylo Ren swung his sword. For someone else, it would have been a wild, aimless blow, but the sword managed to catch her on the arm and tear her shirt. Pain always seemed to focus Kylo Ren.

“I needed this. There’s really nothing like it.” Long black hair had fallen across his face. He thrust his sword forward with a snarl. Kylo tended to accentuate these battles with talk while Phasma couldn’t stand it. It was as though their fight only occupied a part of his mind. 

When he said it though, she realized she felt exactly the same. Fighting with Rey wasn’t like this exactly. There wasn’t the same kind of danger to it. They didn’t fight with weapons and while there was something visceral about a fist connected skin to skin, it was hard to feel more powerful than when you were holding a weapon. The sparring matches with Rey hadn’t felt dangerous to her either. Fighting Kylo Ren one on one felt like battling a raging fire, almost a practice for laughing in the face of death. Phasma wondered briefly if fighting Rey would feel differently now, a bit more dangerous.

Kylo Ren slashed broadly in front of her. Her lance was too far away to counter it and instead dodged with a step backward. Phasma stabbed forward, knowing it would miss. She stepped towards him again hoping to send him back. Instead, he crouched low and pushed up to knock her off balance. Phasma tumbled but landed low in a crouch. She spun around fast, refusing to take her eyes off him and give him the advantage.

They fought in bursts, some longer than others. Kylo Ren liked to test her out, pushing to see how far they could go. Other fights were shorter, fiery burst of energy and skill. Phasma couldn’t describe the pleasure she got from seeing his ass hit the ground, even if her own was down there fairly often too. 

Their session ended the way it always did, with both of them breathing heavily feeling like they could go on a bit longer if forced to but still feeling good. Phasma had sparred with Kylo Ren on nights when he had gone further. He held back less and surged with an untameable fury. He would stop short of seriously injuring or Phasma would find a way of subduing him until he came back to reality. She had gone back to her room with more bruises and bloody noses than she could count but always prided herself on never letting things get worse than that.

“That was good,” said Phasma as she toweled off and caught her breath again. Only when she saw the bright red on the towel did she realize her lip had split. She chewed her bottom lip to try to staunch the bleeding.

Kylo Ren hummed absently. “Nothing can clear my head in the same way, not even meditating. I sense it has the same effect on you.”

Phasma hated the way he talked about her as though she was a fact but nodded. It was true. 

“There is something troubling you. Your thoughts were clouded with it when you got here. Our exercise did you some good too.”

Phasma’s blood ran cold for the first time all night. She had thought she had done well, hiding her internal conflict and even forgetting about it as the night went on. A spark of anger lit in her when she realized he had known all along.

“Rey… what do you know of Rey?” He said it as though Phasma was insignificant. He alluded to Rey’s grand destiny with him in the scheme of everything. What could Phasma, no one, have to do with any of that?

Her first instinct was to leave, to turn her back on him and just keep moving. It felt like it had while they fought though, that it was better to keep her eyes on him than to ever let him see her back.

She resorted to the truth, some version of it at least. “I’ve been training with her. Teaching her some things but mostly providing recreation.” She fed him the official story, the one she wanted to want to be true, instead of the one she was glad was true.

“Recreation,” said Kylo Ren in his slow, stilted way of speaking. “Not quite a lie and yet you act as though it is. What have you done, Phasma?”

“Hux asked me to get close to her. He ordered me to.” Not a lie. This time it didn’t feel like one. 

Kylo Ren stepped closer. He was still several feet away but even that felt intrusive. “True again, but there’s something else isn’t there? Something he doesn’t know. You and I both know he’ll find out sooner or later.”

Phasma couldn’t figure out if he knew the full truth of what she was hiding, but he didn’t go further. 

Kylo didn’t trust her. He never had. From the very beginning, he sensed something duplicitous in her, the loyalty she had to herself above all others. He respected her, sure. He trained with her and was probably closer to her than almost anyone else, but he would never make the mistake of trusting her.

“She’s not dangerous,” said Kylo Ren, backing off at last. “Not to me. You should remember that I hold back in these sessions Phasma. The force makes a powerful enemy. She could turn on you in an instant. Maybe not yet, but with enough practice and the right motivation. She’s not just some girl.”

He tried to trivialize their connection, but Phasma refused to listen. It could have gone worse, Phasma thought, as she headed back to her quarters to clean up. Kylo Ren was temperamental on a good day. Perhaps in the good mood he had been in after fighting, he had decided not to press her for information. Perhaps he really did think she was inconsequential in his view of the grand scheme of all of this.

Phasma chose to ignore his warning. She trusted her own feelings far more than the intuition of Kylo Ren.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried to get this out ASAP but I don't think the wait was too long. I felt really inspired by TLJ and it was super frustrating to be unable to write anything at Christmas. I made a really good breakthrough on my (super late) kylux big bang piece and I have some ideas for post TLJ stuff. Hope you enjoyed the chapter!
> 
> Also: I think I put this in one of the other chapter notes but you can always find me on tumblr [ @keep_on_leggin ](https://keep-on-leggin.tumblr.com/)


	12. Chapter 12

Rey was deep in meditation, which had become part of her daily routine. In the hours that she still spent in isolation without anything to do, she sat on her bed and tried to connect with the force. It was a familiar place to her now, like opening another set of eyes and seeing things differently. She wondered how someone else would have tried to show this to her, Luke Skywalker or Kylo Ren if he ever got his way. The right words to describe what she felt and saw didn’t seem to exist. 

Meditation seemed to make time pass and not just in the sense that it actually gave her something to occupy her time with. Time seemed flexible in the force.

Her daily practice had made her very good at monitoring the hallway outside her room. It had become a familiar space to her. She could sense people out there even when she wasn’t meditating now. If she hadn’t been deprived of almost any other form of stimulation, this increased awareness might have become irritating, but Rey still found herself thrilled by every detail she was able to make out through the force.

This new skill made it easy to know when her solitude would be intruded upon. She could sense Hux striding down the corridor each morning. She knew when her meals would be delivered. She saw the guard salute Phasma when she came to collect Rey each evening.

That day, when fluorescent light from the hall lit her face, Rey couldn't believe she hadn't seen him coming.

Kylo Ren entered in full mask and robes, breath crackling through his vocoder. Rey stood immediately and started looking for a weapon. She refused to face him again without one.

“I came to talk,” he said, removing the helmet and letting his hair spill out.

“I told you I didn’t want to talk.” She would not give him an inch.

Kylo Ren stepped towards her again. She realized she was standing the same way she would to fight Phasma. Her stance was wide and solid. His strange eyes scanned her face.

“You’ve been meditating,” he said, and Rey was caught off guard. “I’ve felt you reaching out through the force. Your technique is not perfect, but it shows remarkable improvement, especially without a teacher.”

Rey crossed her arms. It was a small move that did little to make her feel more protected. She hoped Kylo Ren understood that it meant she would fight him if only she were able. “I don’t need a teacher, and I definitely don't need you.”

As though he couldn’t stand the blaster holes she was staring into his skull, Kylo Ren looked away and began pacing the room in long, slow strides.

“I’m not really in a position to teach anyone at the moment.” his low voice grumbled. He ran a hand through his long hair. Rey wondered if he used the force to keep his hair nice when he took his helmet off. She would have to ask Phasma about it. Phasma kept her hair short and practical for the armor she wore daily.  Surely Kylo Ren’s hair should be a sweaty mess under there. It was an annoying detail about him that irked her even more. “My injuries were a set back to the progress I made and I need to recover before we meet with the Supreme Leader.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” she said, and instantly regretted how petulant it sounded.

Kylo Ren snorted as though he had heard the thought that had followed. This only made her more guarded

“I know you’ve also spent time training with Captain Phasma. I requested access to your training, but I was denied." Rey wondered if she had General Hux to thank for that, one thing they could agree on. “You would do so much better if you could be taught by someone more skilled than a mere foot soldier-”

“I like Phasma.”The words sprang to Phasma’s defense before she could stop them.

“Really?” There was so little emotion in his voice when he was trying to be civil. He still circled the room like a shark. “You don't find her to be a monster just like me? If you knew her the way I do, you might rethink that. You might say she’s almost as terrible as me.”

“No one here seems to have had as much choice in what they’ve done as you.”

Kylo Ren froze. He closed his eyes as he took a moment to marshal his temper. “I actually came to discuss some of that with you.”

“You’re here to convince me the First Order are the good guys? I would have thought Hux would be better at spouting propaganda. Why would he send you?”

Rey received an almost immediate response through the force and Kylo Ren’s body language. Hux didn't even know he was here.

“So that's why I didn't see you.” she murmured. "No one knows you're here."

“I used cloaking, hiding in plain sight by diverting other’s attention. Sometimes it's as simple as a mind trick, but in situations like this it requires a bit more finesse.” Rey wasn't sure how much Kylo Ren did anything with finesse. The spins and twists in his fighting style showed hints of skill and elegance, but beneath that, he was a blunt weapon with no subtlety in his nature. “I learned mind tricks early on at the temple. Unlike you, I never knew a time in my life without the force.”

 _And you threw it all away_ , thought Rey. Kylo Ren frowned but hardly paused at the mental interruption. Rey was growing ever more certain that he really could read her mind. “I learned from Luke Skywalker, my uncle. I was one of his last students.”

There was a note of pride in the way he said it. Rey only knew the barest details of the story, but the idea that he could be proud of such a thing made her sick. “He believed the Jedi were flawless, faultless… Noble and true and just. Do you know anything about the history of the Jedi Order?” he asked Rey and she shook her head slightly.

His voice was mirthless and proud. “They were anything but.”

Rey had had enough of this. “What makes you any better? You murdered children, students. You protect murderers. You promote genocide. You killed your father and left behind your family.” That last piece was something that she connected with. The rest was horrible, absolutely, but for someone who had been abandoned, the crime that set him on the path toward the rest of it seemed the worst of all.

“You want to talk about my family? Fine. My father was Han Solo. My mother was Leia Organa.” _Is_ , thought Rey, hoping he could hear her. “My uncle was Luke Skywalker. Anakin Skywalker was my grandfather.”

 _Legends, all of them_ , she thought. She could have sworn she caught a bitter smile in recognition of that thought.

“You want to know why I left? Why I chose Snoke and the First Order? What I learned from living among legends?” He sat down on her bed and Rey wanted to smack him. It was as if he knew exactly what to do to make her uncomfortable.

“Legends are based on real people,” he said. “and real people have flaws. They fight with each other constantly. They refuse to believe they can ever be wrong. They make mistakes. They make bad decisions. Legends are people who get lucky and receive far too much power. They are, unfortunately, just like everyone else.”

“You should go,” said Rey, unnerved by the sudden swing in his emotions.

Kylo Ren gave her a quick assessment, looking her up and down. “Maybe I shouldn’t have come here. We’ll have to travel together in a less than three day’s time. I guess it was foolish of me to think I could get you to hate me a bit less by then.”

Rey nodded. It was true for the most part. “There is no way I’ll ever forget what you did, just as I haven’t forgotten what everyone else here is guilty of. I’ll never join you and become complicit in all of this.”

“You’re still under the impression that you have a choice.” Kylo Ren stood as a way of placating her without leaving just yet. “You don’t,” he said simply. The blunt truth of his statement hurt for a moment. “And the sooner you accept that, the better.”

With her arms crossed in front of her, she continued to stare him down. “We’ll see about that. Why do you want me to meet Snoke, anyway?” Again, Rey felt like she knew part of the story, but not everything. “Why would you bother training me when I’ve already told you I’ll never fight for you? I’m not complaining, but wouldn’t you be better off killing me and saving yourselves the trouble?”

“The Supreme Leader is confident that he will be able to persuade you and I know that even if he cannot, he will be able to break you.”

The last words sent a shiver down her spine. “Did he have to break you? Is that what he does? He murders those who get in his way and tortures the ones he needs.”

Kylo Ren moved in close to her. Her back was almost against the wall, but she stood her ground. “You don’t know anything about it and I hope you never have to learn. You’ll see.” He let the last hang in the air as a threat or a promise. Slowly, he realized that he was standing a bit too close. He backed off, almost embarrassed. “I think this is the longest civil conversation we’ve ever had.”

Rey nearly rolled her eyes at that. “I know how to behave civilly when it's in my best interests. I’m not stupid, I know I won’t get out of here so I’ll play along for as long as I can. I’ll go with you to Snoke and I won’t try to kill you, but when I speak to you and look at you don’t you dare assume I feel anything but repulsed by you.” She spoke cooly, removing all emotion from her voice. It was easier than she had expected and she was proud of it. “Now get out.”

Kylo Ren took a minute to process that. She half expected him to lose his temper finally, but he assented in turn.

“That’s all I can ask for, I suppose.” He turned to leave. “Good day, Rey.”

Rey shivered when he left. At least this recent interaction with Kylo Ren hadn’t left her catatonic like the last. Instead, she was furious.

She only had three days to escape or meet Snoke face to face. It wasn’t so much that she was afraid of him, it was that she wanted to avoid him at all cost. He was a mysterious force user that had Kylo Ren and the entire First Order under his control. Rey wasn’t a fan of either of them, the First Order or the force user she’d spoken to moments ago, but they were both powerful entities that served one being. Rey had lived on the outskirts of this conflict for so long and she longed for the empty deserts of Jakku.

Living here for a while had convinced her that there was no way she could escape on her own. She was getting stronger in the force, but it couldn’t be relied on to get her as far as a hangar. It was frustrating. The progress she was making in the force was astounding, but she only had one chance at this; one chance and not a lot of time left. 

She thought of Finn and how he had escaped with the help of Resistance hot-shot Poe Dameron. Or maybe it was the other way around. Finn was able to get Poe to that TIE fighter and Poe was able to fly them to freedom. There was a chance Rey might be able to get herself out of this on her own, but she would have a better chance if she had some help.

The stormtroopers she had met were nice enough, but could she trust any of them to help her? For a moment, she indulged in the fantasy she had been harboring in her heart. The one where Phasma burst through the door to her room, blaster cocked, armor gleaming, helmet mysteriously absent so that she could look Rey in the eyes when she said: “I’m here to rescue you.”

No.

It broke her heart to even think it, but there was no way Phasma would ever help her escape. She was, if not loyal to the cause of the First Order, loyal to herself. There was no chance she would surrender the position she had secured for herself here for a life on the run with her. Rey wasn’t even sure she could ask that of her. They hardly knew each other, did they? A few days felt like so much more, but it wasn’t and it would never be. Telling Phasma any of this was tantamount to putting the binders on her wrists herself. They had shared something special, there was no denying that, but she wasn’t about to stretch their relationship past its limits.  

She was fine with that. Really.

Rey pushed past that idea and focused on her only real options. Spot and Double were right out. Double was intensely loyal to the First Order, and as the leader of the group had been suspicious of Rey from the start. She didn’t know Spot well at all, but he was older and seemed stuck in his ways. Lucky and Threes had been kind to her, but both of them were loyal to the cause. She wasn’t sure if she was being foolishly optimistic, but she thought Seven-seven and Nine-oh might be her best options.

Part of her wanted Finn’s former squad members to carry on his legacy. She wanted to believe that they secretly wanted to defect as he did and would help her if she asked. But again, wasn’t this just another dream?

She would use what was left of her time here to find out. She needed to act quickly and carefully. Her life was at stake.

Rey spared a thought for Finn and the Resistance. Not only had she seen him during the meeting she'd been dragged to yesterday, she had spoken to him. He was alive somewhere in the galaxy and he wanted to rescue her. She had tried not to dwell on it because it seemed counterproductive. She could think about Finn once she had escaped or in the moments before she faced Snoke, but while she still had a chance of seeing him again, thoughts of him could wait. The idea that the Resistance might come to rescue her seemed absurd. She supposed it had happened once, but it had failed hadn’t it? They had lost Han Solo and barely escaped with their lives, though she supposed the destruction of Starkiller Base had been a major victory. Would they risk it again now that they were on the run and without such a huge target to take in the process?

No, Rey couldn’t rely on them. She would put her trust in the one person she had always counted on: herself.

That mind-trick on the guard outside her room this morning had been all too easy. She wondered if, someone who was already partially willing, could be convinced to help her escape by the same method. She would just need to find a suitable candidate.

This could work, she decided. It was one of the reasons she had been so desperate to meet a few of the stormtroopers in the first place. One of them had to be sympathetic to her cause. One of them had to have known Finn or at least have heard about him. She had lucked out in both respects.

Rey thought of the slow, fat tears that had rolled down Nine-oh’s face when she had mentioned Finn. Maybe she didn’t need to be lucky like Poe Dameron had been in finding Finn, ready and willing to betray the First Order. Maybe she didn’t need luck; she had the force on her side.

Tomorrow she would get closer to Nine-oh. His tears meant that he cared for Finn and maybe that was enough to get him to help her. She needed to be sure though, sure that he wouldn’t betray her or at least that she could trick him into not betraying her. All she had to do was get to a ship. At night, she had mapped out the route to the nearest hangar from what she had seen through the force. Having a stormtrooper with her would provide the extra security she needed to get out with a bit of a head start.

Just the idea of freedom being within her grasp made it almost impossible to sleep. She knew she would need those hours of rest very soon regardless of whichever way things went. Still, it reverberated in her mind. 

In three days, she might be free of the First Order. In three days, she might be on her way with Kylo Ren to be delivered into the hands of Snoke. In three days, she would say goodbye to Phasma, likely for good.

It was all so close to coming to an end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There we go! It's really starting to hit me how close this is to being complete. I'm excited and scared, but most of all happy and proud to have come so far. Thank you for staying with me!


	13. Chapter 13

If Kylo Ren had visited Rey again on her penultimate day aboard the Finalizer, he might have been able to stop her. The plot she had in mind was the only thing she could concentrate on. It hummed through her until even Rey thought she could sense it in the force. 

Instead of Kylo Ren, General Hux came to see her early in the morning. He was neatly pressed as usual, but with a slightly panicked glint in his eyes, which Rey could only assume was due to their ever increasing proximity to their Supreme Leader. Rey was glad he was about as force sensitive as a rock and couldn’t discern what she was thinking the way Kylo Ren could. Still, she knew she needed to act in a way that matched her position, or at least, the position she would be in if she didn’t have a hope of escaping. 

He told her that the next forty-eight hours would proceed as usual. As planned she would attend midday meal with the same LM squadron of stormtroopers she had interacted with before and tonight she would meet with Phasma for the last time. They had agreed to these conditions at the start of this whole venture and it seemed important to Hux that he appear to be a man of his word. Rey was not impressed by the gesture, but she was glad that both of these were scheduled for her. She needed a chance to speak with Nine-Oh and she desperately needed to see Phasma before she left, likely for good.

Tomorrow she would be escorted to a hangar to meet Kylo Ren and board the shuttle that would take them down to Snoke’s homeworld where he awaited them. Rey couldn’t help but picture some ink black monster, a shadow more than anything, sitting on a throne; his gnarled, skeletal hands curved over the sides and slowly tapping. She could almost hear a low laugh like a storm in the distance coming from whatever hole he lurked in. Rey had never encountered Snoke. She had no idea what he looked like, but whenever he was mentioned this nightmare image she couldn’t seem to shake rose to the surface of her mind.

Rey let the General talk for most of their encounter. She had learned by now that he could carry on a conversation all by himself when he wanted to, and could speak at length about the minutiae of military protocol. Rather than risk drawing unwanted suspicion, she chose to keep quiet for most of their encounter. While the General seemed distracted by his own importance and liked to hear himself talk, he could also be dangerously perceptive. There was always the chance she might let something slip that suggested she did not intend to follow through with any of his plans.

He left soon enough. It seemed he too had learned something from her. Hux didn’t offer her any platitudes or a comforting crocodile smile. The situation before them had changed and perhaps this was a sign of respect. Rey almost appreciated it.

Two members of the LM squadron escorted her to the mess hall, just as the General had said they would. Once you were aware of the routine of life in a military, it almost became a comfort.

Threes and Lucky walked with her, just as they had the last time. She supposed it was part of their regular shift rotations. 

The mood at the table was different from their previous meeting. Everyone appeared subdued. When she had met with them last, Rey thought she had made some headway in getting them to like her. Now, their friendliness seemed clouded by distrust. Even the interactions between the members of the squad were shorter and more brusque than before. 

Spot was doing the best job out of all of them in pretending that everything was fine. He was in the middle of telling some long-winded story when she arrived. He poorly explained the beginning again for her, something about an incident in training when he was younger but the details kept changing. He was loud and smiled, but for all of his efforts, he only made the other’s  silence seem conspicuous in comparison. 

“What’s going on?” She asked finally. Spot shut his mouth abruptly. Rey hadn’t meant to cut him off, but she hadn’t realized that he was still telling his story. 

The others looked to Double who was the only one able to look back at her. “Everyone is really eager to get deployed again,” she said, speaking for the group. “It’s hard being assigned to a ship for so long once you’ve seen battle.” Her excuse was clearly not true, or at least not the whole truth, but the rest of the squad relaxed once she had said it. They had something they could blame their strangeness on. 

“I didn’t realize this was unusual for you all, but I should have known my being here would have lots of consequences.” Even things like troop deployment were all her fault. “If I’ve learned anything while I’m here it’s that I’m a grain of sand in your ‘fierce machine’.” There was a rueful laugh at the end that she didn’t quite intend. 

After she had said something about the odd mood at the table, the troopers closest to her warmed to her a bit more, but it was still clear that something in their feelings towards her had changed. Seven-seven and Nine-oh were the only constant. They continued to flatly ignore her on the opposite end of the table. 

Despite feeling a bit guilty, Rey found that she didn’t really care what had made the squadron turn against her. In the end, it didn’t really matter. When she had first met them, she had hoped she might find someone like Finn among them; just an ordinary stormtrooper who might want to fight for good. Instead, she found ordinary people, good people maybe, who were just doing their small part in the grand scheme of everything. If she had more time, she might have been able to turn them. Rey tried not to feel like this too was her fault. 

“I’m supposed to leave tomorrow,” she said when she felt as though her time with them was coming to an end. “There’s a chance I’ll never see any of you again.” She sighed because a part of her really was sad about all of this. “I’d like to thank you for… for even just speaking to me.” 

There was genuine feeling in her when she said this, but it was also a bit of quiet scheming. She had to get one of them to help her, likely Nine-oh, but she needed to garner some sympathy first. 

“Where are you headed?” asked Spot. Double gave him a half-hearted look of warning; stormtroopers weren’t meant to ask questions like this. She stopped herself from admonishing him. Rey could tell she felt slightly guilty for not having been very welcoming to Rey at all. 

“I’m going with Kylo Ren to train with Supreme Leader Snoke.” She channeled some latent fear into her voice. “I have no idea what’s going to happen.” Rey projected her voice to be sure that Seven-seven and Nine-oh could hear her. It was hard not to smile when Nine-oh looked up. 

“You’re joining the First Order, then?” asked Threes. 

“Not if I can help it,” said Rey, honestly. “I’m sorry,” she added quickly. “I’m sure that’s not what you wanted to hear.” 

Everyone wore similar versions of the same stony expression. They might not have been clones but they all had mannerisms that made it seem like they were. 

Lucky broke the silence. “Well, I’ll be sorry to see you go, Rey. I don’t think we could have gotten a better assignment than looking after you for the last few weeks.” Threes gave him a sharp glance. Double stared him down while trying to appear calm. Neither of them was sure where he was going with this. “I’ll be really sorry when Kylo Ren murders you.” 

At that, Threes punched him in the arm and hauled him to his feet. “If you’ll excuse us.” She spoke mainly to Double who nodded. Spots chuckled a little beside her. 

“Don’t mind him, he means well,” said Spot. Rey knew he did. 

“It’s not as though it isn’t true,” said Rey. Spot sobered up quickly. “I just wish things could have been different, you know? Everything changed so suddenly. It’s hard to think that my life might be over soon too.” 

“You could always join us,” said Seven-seven, speaking for the first time all day. “It’s not like you don’t have a choice.” 

Rey looked at her straight on, her face open and earnest. Now was her chance and she took a moment to make every word right. “I'm not so sure that I do. Whenever I think about it, my mind keeps coming back to Finn, FN-2187. I didn’t know Finn for very long,” she started slowly. “You probably knew him longer, but he told me what it was like being a part of the First Order. I lived on Jakku, nowhere by most people’s estimates, but even there the First Order had its influence. I’ve seen the atrocities the First Order is capable of even if the individuals who comprise it are mostly decent. I’m not going to be another decent person under the sway of something that powerful and dangerous. I grew close to Finn while I knew him and I won’t betray my memory of him by joining the organization he risked his life to escape.” 

 _There_ , she thought when she was finished. If that speech didn’t move them, nothing would. All eyes were on her when she finished. Even Nine-oh was unable to continue ignoring her when she spoke about Finn like that. Rey didn’t notice the tear sliding off her cheek before she wiped it away. She couldn’t tell if it was a product of her manipulation or of how badly she wanted to see Finn again. 

Double stood up at the table. She moved deliberately and in complete silence. Rey knew that this meant it was time to go. 

Double and Nine-oh escorted her back to her cell. Neither of them said a word to her as they walked. Double enforced the tense silence in the way she held herself beneath her white armor. Even Rey felt reluctant to break it. 

When they reached her room, Rey knew it was time to make her move. She faced Double and tried to picture the face beneath the helmet. This would be easier if Rey could see her. She held out a hand and closed her eyes. “You look the other way and forget the next two minutes.” 

It still managed to surprise her when Double obeyed without hesitation. She could feel Nine-oh beginning to panic at her side. “It’s alright,” said Rey, trying to calm him. “I’m not going to hurt you, I just wanted to talk.” 

Nine-oh raised his blaster and trained it on her. Rey put up her hands to show she meant no harm but realized the gesture was not helping. She didn’t feel nervous standing on the wrong end of the blaster though. There was a calm inside of her that she relied on and it gave her the confidence necessary to proceed in what she was about to do. 

“I’ve been watching you, Nine-oh. You’re different from the other troopers in your squadron.”

Nine-oh scoffed through the vocoder. When he spoke, his voice came out a bit higher than usual. “I’m not. You don’t know what you’re talking about.” The blaster in his hands quivered a little. 

“You took Finn’s loss harder than the others, harder than Seven-seven. You two must have been close.” 

The nose of the blaster dropped slightly. “So what if we were? I knew him my whole life and now he’s just… gone.” 

Rey tried to slowly move closer to Nine-oh. He still had his blaster on her, but she decided to take the chance that he wouldn’t shoot her. “He’s not gone, Nine-oh. He escaped. He’s with the Resistance and he’s happier there than he’s ever been.” 

“He abandoned us. We’re his brothers and he left us behind.” Nine-oh’s voice had become thick like he was choking back tears under his helmet. “ I knew he didn’t like it here. He told me so, but it was obvious to everyone. He did so well in all of his exams but he never tried to fit in.”   

“He told you that the First Order does terrible things to innocent people and that he didn’t want to be a part of it anymore.” This was a guess on Rey’s part, but it appeared she had guessed correctly when Nine-oh dropped his blaster down to his side. “Maybe you could have helped him.” 

“Why would I have helped him?” 

“Because you loved him and wanted him to be happy.” Rey had been able to sense it from Nine-oh. Maybe it had been a sort of filial affection, but he had cared for Finn. Again, she was reaching a bit, but she had to try everything in order to convince him to help her. “I’m just trying to get back to him, Nine-oh, and I need your help.” 

The stormtrooper had gone quiet for a moment. They didn’t have much time before Rey’s mind-trick wore off on Double. Nine-oh looked at Double who was facing away from them, but not for much longer. 

“What did you do to her anyway?” he asked, nervously. 

Rey answered, even though she suspected he was trying to buy time. “You heard me. I used the force.” 

“To make her turn around and not remember what we’re saying. If you can make people do whatever you want, why can’t you just force me to help you? Why even bother trying to convince me to become a traitor?” He spoke quickly and asked a lot of questions. Stormtroopers weren’t meant to ask questions. 

“You’re right. Maybe I could use the force to manipulate you into helping me, but I’d rather not take the chance that something might go wrong.” She had decided that honesty would be the safest method to use with Nine-oh. “I can pilot a ship by myself if you don’t want to come with me, but I need an escort down to the hangar or at least someone to make sure I don’t get stopped along the way.” 

She left out the part where using the force to manipulate her surroundings gave her a minor headache and she hated to think what might happen if she pushed too far past unknown limits. There was still so much she didn’t know about using the force and this wasn’t something she could leave up to chance. 

Nine-oh stood there for a moment. Perhaps he was considering what Rey had proposed, but it was hard to be sure what he was doing beneath that helmet. 

“You just need me to walk you down there? Nothing else? Just make sure that no one sees you?” 

Rey nodded. “I’m pretty good with tech. I should be able to steal a ship and I’m prepared to deal with any TIE fighters that come after me on my own.” That must have sounded like a suicide attempt to Nine-oh. “But you’re welcome to come with me.” 

Double made a thoughtful murmur and Rey’s eyes widened, knowing that her time was up. She stepped inside her cell and flashed a pleading look at Nine-oh. With his helmet still securely in place, it was impossible to tell what he might be thinking. Rey’s force-guided intuition wasn’t strong enough to discern what he planned on doing either. 

It would have to be enough. Perhaps, even if Nine-oh still refused to help her, he would at least be sympathetic enough to make performing a mind-trick on him a bit easier. If she did end up having to trick him, she knew know that her suspicions had been correct. Nine-oh wasn’t ready to leave the First Order behind, but his connection to Finn might end up saving her. 

Nine-oh would be on guard duty when Rey returned from her work-out with Phasma tonight. This was her only chance. Her escape would happen tonight.

 

\----------------------------------------

At first, Finn was upset with Organa for misleading him about their negotiation tactics with the First Order. He had gone into their brief negotiations believing he was about to present terms for the safe return of Rey. Instead, he had been part of a gambit he only learned the truth of afterward. 

“I’m sorry, Finn, but we were never going to bargain with the First Order, not for anyone,” said Organa as soon as she cut off the holo-call. 

Finn had been furious. “Then what was the point of all this?” Leia fired off a few quick orders. They would send another message to the First Order with, to Finn, what seemed like ridiculous terms.   

“We gained intelligence,” said Leia when she could give him her full attention. She looked up at him with a seriousness that had brought an end to the Empire. “We know for certain now that Rey is alive and in First Order custody. We needed that information before we even considered moving on to something bigger like a rescue. We know she’s with them and she’s safe.” She caught the look that had passed over Finn’s face. “Relatively safe. And because it was you on the call, we were able to stall them for just long enough to get a rough idea of the location of the Finalizer. You bought us the few seconds of direct signal we needed in order to verify that intel. I know you’re upset, but you did well, Finn.” 

It took a moment to process what she had told him. “So we have everything we need now. We know where she is, we can go get her.” 

General Organa looked around. Her eyes scanned the room as she looked past the bustling Resistance members. “Not so fast,” she said before finding what she had been looking for. She called Poe Dameron over to them. “Well Poe, I have good news and bad news for you.” 

Poe’s brow arched in confusion. He looked at Finn and then back to Organa. “General?” 

“We have what you’ve been waiting for: everything we need to track down the First Order flagship.” 

Poe’s eyes widened. “You mean-?” 

“You know I can’t authorize a full-scale rescue mission, but I might be able to buy you some time if you were to leave the base for a few days.” 

There was a brief moment of consideration. Poe let out a slow breath. He looked to Finn again and seemed to make up his mind. “Okay.” 

General Organa nodded with a small, bitter smile. “Let’s head to my office so we can talk.”    

They followed in step behind her. “Are you sure you want to do this?” Finn asked, keeping his voice low. ”You don’t have to. I just need to do everything I can to get her out of there.” 

“Buddy, I’m doing this for the both of you. You need a pilot and she needs to get the hell out of there. I’m with you.” Poe squeezed Finn’s shoulder to reassure him. Finn smiled back at him. Sometimes it was hard to believe the kindness of the people he was now surrounded with. 

Leia let them in and shut the door behind her. She stood behind her desk and turned on a holo display. The blue light illuminated the room with a map of the galaxy. In the center of the map was a pulsing red dot. “The First Order was transmitting from deep in the Unknown Regions. Our analysts were able to slice into their signal. I’ve had a light freighter prepared with the light speed calculations. It should take you almost a full cycle to arrive far enough away from the Finalizer so that you won’t be picked up on their scanners and make the jump.” 

Finn frowned. “A full cycle? Then there's no time to waste.” 

“Slow down for a moment before you make me regret this.” General Organa sighed. Maybe she was too old to keep up with these trigger-happy flyboys. “You need a plan for how you are going to get in and out once you’re there. We have rough schematics of the ship-” 

“I remember everything about that ship,” said Finn. “The security system is pretty advanced. A freighter is going to be picked up on their scanners pretty quickly.” 

“Would they pick up something as small as an escape pod?” asked Poe. “I could fly us in close enough to a hangar and you could get down in an escape pod.” 

“They would be able to pick it up but there’s a pretty good chance they would ignore it as debris,” Finn spoke quickly, getting excited about the possibility that this might work. Then he caught himself. “On the other hand, there’s a chance they’ll scan for life forms. If they’ve got their TIE fighters chasing off an unknown freighter, they’ll already be suspicious.”

The three of them considered this. “What if you used a droid?” suggested Leia. “I seem to recall your BB unit is fairly resourceful.” She looked to Poe.

Poe bit his lip. He really loved that little droid, but he knew there was no way BB-8 was going to let Poe leave his astromech behind. “Yeah, yeah BB-8 can do it. Finn can tell him where to go. I’ll be able to buy us a few minutes while BB-8 finds Rey and gets to a ship.”

General Organa nodded gravely. It sounded as though their plan was complete. There was nothing more to say.

“So it’s settled. We’ll head out now if there’s nothing else,” said Finn, looking towards the General with more respect in his eyes than ever.

“I have nothing else for you boys. Just be careful,” she said with a sparkle in her eye before adding, “And may the force be with you.”

Finn and Poe practically ran to the tarmac where they found the ‘light freighter’ Leia had prepared for them. The Millenium Falcon was not the prettiest looking ship, but Finn knew what it was capable of. 

Poe, however, was less than impressed. “Can this hunk of junk even hit light speed?” He kicked one of the struts with his foot tentatively. His teeth were bared in a sort of uncertain frown.

“I’ve seen this ship do more than that. We’ll be fine.” The Millenium Falcon had gotten them onto Starkiller and helped Finn escape when things fell apart. In the hands of the right pilot, it worked wonders.

Finn spared a thought for Chewbacca who had rescued him. He hadn’t seen the Wookiee since and thought he should thank him if he ever got the chance. The language gap would need to be overcome, but he was pretty sure he could get his point across. His thoughts were interrupted by a growl from above.

“You must be my co-pilot,” said Poe, addressing the figure who lowered the gangway for them. 

Chewbacca called out in Shyriiwook. Neither Finn or Poe spoke the language, but BB-8 beeped something in binary and rolled aboard. The two of them followed the droid, smiling as they passed. Chewbacca clapped Finn on the shoulder with one large, hairy hand. The gesture seemed fairly universal.

 

\----------------------------------------

Phasma was especially nervous about meeting Rey tonight. They hadn’t met to train for the last two nights, though notably, they had met for other reasons once in that time. Tonight was the first time she would see Rey since that night they had spent together. This was their first training session since Rey had used the force in their fight. 

Phasma was nervous about it, but perhaps not as much as she would have been if they hadn’t cleared the air after that fight; if Rey still thought she was afraid. There was no telling how awful Phasma would have felt now if that uncertainty was still there. That uncertainty was still there in a way. What was coming in the near future was still a mystery, but with Rey leaving in the morning it was at least out of Phasma’s hands now.

“Ready to go?” She asked from the doorway.

Rey was still lacing up her shoes. Her ability to tie them herself was a new one, but with the tightening of the last knot, she proved she didn’t have trouble anymore. She leaped from the bed to join Phasma in the hallway. Impulsively, she took Phasma's hand and entwined their fingers. Her heart trilled.

“I feel different,” she said. “I can't even begin to explain it.”

Phasma raised an eyebrow. “In a good way?”

“I think so,” she said coyly before grinning at her and giving herself away. Rey wondered if giving her a kiss would be pushing this too far.

Phasma didn’t say anything but smiled to herself.

She wondered what the two of them looked like to the people they passed on their way to the training room. Holding hands made her feel like a girl; silly, sweet, and overwhelmingly love-struck. A few officers gave their unusual public display of affection with an arched brow and even a glare. Officers weren’t permitted to even laugh while in uniform. Seeing such casual intimacy must have been a bit of a shock. Without her mask, Phasma was unrecognizable as the chrome plated Captain Phasma and she found that with Rey’s hand in hers, she didn’t mind their stares.

They went to the training room they used in the beginning of their sessions. “I thought it would be a good idea to keep from sparring after what happened last time,” said Phasma. She tried to keep her voice light, but that had never come easily to her.

When they entered the room and separated, Phasma noticed that Rey’s expression had darkened. Her expression was resolute and brave, but not without worry. For all the innocence Rey projected, she held so much sorrow just beneath the surface.

“Hey,” Phasma started when Rey turned away from her. “Whatever happens next can’t be that bad.” The words sounded false even as they came out of her mouth. She could add something like, as long as we’re together everything would be alright, but there was decent possibility that they might never see each other again.

Rey didn’t try to contradict her. She simply nodded and began stretching. 

Phasma couldn’t take her eyes off of her. She seemed so closed off and alone, and it felt like there was nothing Phasma could do to change that. Rey brought one arm behind her head in a stretch. Her eyes flicked to the tight bicep muscle she was flexing and the exposed edge of her sharply defined abdominal muscles. Rey had been skinny and wiry from subsistence living. After a few weeks of receiving adequate nutrition along with their exercise together, her scavenger remained small but was now fairly well-built. 

“Kylo Ren came to see me yesterday,” said Rey in a near whisper.

Phasma wanted to throttle the thick-headed Sith. “Did he-”

“We just talked,” said Rey as she sat down to stretch the muscles in her legs. Phasma’s gaze now followed the languid curve of her back down to her shapely ass. Phasma had a hard time believing that Ren could marshal his temper long enough to hold a conversation. “He said that when we get wherever we’re going, he’s going to take me to his master.”

Phasma wasn’t high ranked enough to know very much about their mysterious Supreme Leader. Most people assumed he was in contact with the General, and it was common knowledge that Kylo Ren had trained under him. Other than that, he was shrouded in secrecy. Once again, Phasma couldn’t offer her much consolation.

“I’m scared,” Rey confessed. “But mostly because I have no idea what is going to happen. My whole time here has just been holding my breath between one galaxy-defining event and the next. I’ve just been waiting to see what the next set of challenges is going to be… but as scared as I am, I just want to get started.”

Phasma was confused. “I’m not going to join the First Order,” continued Rey. “I will not fight for a cause that tries to justify the destruction of a star system. And I don’t know much about the Empire, but I think we’re better off without it.”

Rey moved closer to Phasma, crawling over to where she sat. The space between them was too much for this moment. It was hard to hear Rey insult the First Order, but it was even more difficult not to kiss her when she was this close. She looked down at their hands joined together as though for some sacred rite. “I trust you enough to say this,” Rey said, locking eyes with her. “I don’t know why you fight for the First Order, but I’ve accepted that you do. I can’t justify whatever horrible things you’ve done, but if you ever made the choice to leave, I would be the first to forgive you.”

Without waiting for Phasma to respond, Rey stood and walked over to a machine to begin to work out. It was her only concession to how much the strength of these feelings scared her. Phasma was left for a moment in stunned silence. Several different emotions welled up at once, not one winning out over the others. What Rey was suggesting was treason, plain and simple, and she couldn’t believe it. Had she convinced herself that Rey was something other than rebel scum? That their love would convince her to stay and fight? That they could have a future?

She could laugh at her own gullibility if it weren’t for the pain it had caused her. For all the time she’d known Rey she had assumed Rey was the naive one. So sheltered and inexperienced, and yet Rey hadn’t been to swoon under the influence of first love, that had been Phasma. She took her anger out in deadlifts. She pushed herself a bit harder than she would have otherwise, grunting in her efforts. She hoped Rey wouldn’t notice. The girl seemed preoccupied in her own traitorous thoughts.

Something like disgust was beginning to settle in the pit of her stomach, though she couldn’t tell who it was for. Perhaps she was remembering reconditioning from years ago, coming back to her as punishment for even considering a life without the Order.

The war the First Order waged was her life, there was nothing for her outside of it. She had never even considered what would happen if they won, whatever winning would mean. Did it mean the annihilation of the Resistance? The installation of First Order governance throughout the galaxy? That had never been for Phasma to decide. She had never known a life of peace, even before she had joined the First Order. There didn’t seem to be a way to conceive of a life without violence. Life had always been a fight.

Rey had asked her to leave the Order. The girl Phasma thought she might be in love with, had asked her to leave her entire life behind. Did Rey know anything about her? Not as much as Phasma had hoped, if she believed Phasma would ever betray the First Order. The First Order had saved her from her old life. It allowed her to realize her full potential. She was not going to give that up so easily. 

They spent the evening on opposite sides of the gym, both too deep in their own thoughts to really see the other.

The end of the hour came soon enough and they moved to the showers. Sonic showers weren't great places for thoughtful contemplation and soon they were ready to leave.

Rey was the first to speak when it was all over. “I guess I forgot what you told me the other night. The First Order means more to you than I’ll ever be able to understand. With Finn as my only example of a stormtrooper… I assumed everyone would feel the same way he did. I guess there's a reason more stormtroopers don't defect.”

Phasma nodded. “I don't pretend to know everything about galactic politics, but I believe that the people in command want what is best for the galaxy, even if they go about it in radical ways.” She took Rey’s hand in hers, a clumsy attempt at supplication. “I hope you'll come to see that in time.”

Rey’s face held a nervous smile. “I told you I don't want to be converted.”

When they bid each other good night, Phasma found herself unable to leave. For all the confused emotions still built up inside her, she was still left with something she needed to say. 

“Rey, I know that if you are anything like me, there is little I can say that will change your mind. I told you before that I don't have all the answers to the galaxy's problems, but I am sure of one thing. There is this… hope I have,” Putting words to the feelings pent up inside of her was going to be more difficult than she thought. “I have hope that there is a universe out there in which we have a future. It doesn't seem likely that it's this one. Maybe it's something to do with the force, however that works, but I feel like we were fated, even just for a little while.”

The words came out in fits and starts but she quickly found that she was unable to stop. She had to keep going. “I will do everything I can to help the First Order. It’s my life, as much a part of me as any other part you fell in love with.” She wondered briefly if it was too optimistic to suggest that Rey might feel the same as she did. The thought stirred some anxiety in her chest but passed swiftly. “I won't ignore the part of myself that has a home here, just as I won't ask you to choose between me and the side you're on.” 

With complete disregard for stormtrooper LM-3590 standing beside the door, Rey reached up and wrapped both arms around her neck. Her delightfully soft hair nestled under Phasma's chin. “I won’t ask you again,” she said, softly.

They stayed like that for a moment. Rey held herself to Phasma as though she hated the thought of ever letting go. In this closeness, Phasma realized that she was still just as small as she had been that day they had rescued her from Starkiller. There was still this energy and vitality in her that made her seem larger than life. It emanated from her still. Since they had grown closer, she had stopped noticing what a rarity she was. Now that they were so physically close, it was a wonder to her once more.

Rey’s breathing seemed to match her own. She wondered if Rey could hear her heartbeat with her ear pressed to Phasma’s chest.

“I feel it too,” she said, in a voice only Phasma could hear. Her voice was hardly a whisper, as though if she said it any louder it might make it untrue. “Maybe not fate or the force, but something just as strong.” She looked up into Phasma’s face with a sad smile. “You can’t blame me for not wanting to give you up.”

Phasma wondered if Rey knew how tightly she was wrapped around her finger.

“Perhaps, seeing as it’s my last night on board,” Rey’s eyes flicked down to Phasma’s lips. Her teeth pulled at the edges of her own. It was a gesture that surprised Phasma. It seemed like an inexpert attempt at something more mature that fascinated Phasma all the same. “You could stay the night, one last time?

There was no way she could refuse. Yes, it was improper; Yes, their last encounter like this had caused her countless headaches; Yes, she knew she shouldn’t, but all of those objections sounded like a wave of affirmations to her. Yes, of course, she would.

She leaned and captured Rey’s soft lips in hers. It was soft and slow, unlike most of their prior kisses. This was something to savor, for as long as they were allowed to have it.

“Of course I will,” she said and Rey brought her inside.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's up at last! I hope you can see now why this took so long to put up. It's twice the length of pretty much every other chapter so I felt alright taking twice the time with it. I'm so excited. These last chapters are getting to the parts of this fic I only imagined and now they're starting to feel concrete you know? You picture them for so long and now someone else can picture it too.
> 
> This fic has only one more chapter! I'm considering writing an epilogue for it so don't be surprised if by the next chapter you see the chapter count go up to 15.
> 
> Anyway, thank you as always for reading. I hope those of you who were really looking forward to this follow me on tumblr; I posted about a week ago that I was postponing this chapter. That said, I recently made a twitter for fan stuff so you can now follow me [@a_ginger_midget](https://twitter.com/a_ginger_midget) if you want.


	14. Chapter 14

There were few words left for them to share now. Anything they could have said would have been too much, just more of the same. They didn’t need to talk about what was about to happen. The morning would come soon enough and they would be forced to face it. There were no more questions to ask of each other. Everything had already been answered. Rey invited Phasma to sit down on the bed with her and so she did. 

They were curled around each other. Phasma laid down on the cold sheets of Rey’s bed first, her back hitting the cold durasteel wall. Rey nestled in beside her. Without any words, Rey implored Phasma to hold her. Something in the way she moved asked for someone to hold her and tell her that things were going to be okay. No one was capable of the latter, but Phasma draped one arm across Rey’s waist. Their bodies just seemed to fit together in a way that Phasma didn’t have to think about. This sort of effortless tenderness warmed the dark room. 

Rey reached for Phasma’s hand and pulled it close to her chest. Everything about her seemed controlled and certain. She pressed the softest kiss onto the back of Phasma’s hand. It was strange not being able to see Rey’s face. Without it, she lacked even the vaguest hint at what Rey might be thinking. Were her eyes open?

Together, their breathing was slow and even, matching with each other as they laid there longer. There was something odd about knowing that in their stillness, Rey was awake too. 

She wondered if they would fall asleep like this. The hours would pass them by and they would face the new day still clinging to each other. Phasma didn’t usually sleep on her side. Already she could feel her hip starting to fall asleep, but she didn’t dare move. 

Her thumb traced circles on the back of Rey’s hand. This minuscule attempt at comfort was amplified by the quiet of their moment. They had stolen this tranquility from somewhere else in the universe and hidden it away in this room where no one else could touch them. 

She had never experienced an intimacy like this before. It was different from even the last time she had spent the night here when they had had sex and shared the same bed until morning. That had been a testament to their deep attraction, more instinctual than anything else. While it had felt so good and was still something she longed for, Phasma knew this was something more than that. There was a certain amount of trust in this that even sex was not quite equal to. In the past, there had been times when Phasma hadn’t thought herself capable of letting someone get this close to her or of wanting to be this close to someone else. Lying in the dark pressed together for warmth was something deep and primal. It was a promise of protection, of peace and strength. Another warm body to stay beside you even in the darkest times. There was a desire for something more than a physical connection that couldn’t be expressed in words. It was an attempt to say that I want to be near you, always.

Phasma fell asleep like that, almost afraid to move. 

Something about Phasma that hadn’t changed in all of this was that Phasma was an uncommonly light sleeper. It had been a necessary survival skill where she came from, one that had served her well. She noticed immediately when Rey shifted beside her. Initially, she tried to shrug it off. Of course, Rey would need to shift position. They couldn’t stay like that all night comfortably. It was when Rey sat up fully that Phasma opened her eyes.

Phasma was confused and something in her features must have signaled as much to Rey. Rey smiled weakly, which didn’t manage to comfort Phasma at all. She placed her hand on Phasma’s shoulder, in a soothing way. This too only made Phasma wonder what was wrong. 

She suspected what was happening, of course, but didn’t want it to be true.

“It’s alright,” said Rey. “Go back to sleep.” 

Phasma’s lips parted to object, to say anything, but stopped before she could. Her mind slowly realized it was a command; one made imperative through the force. Rey leaned in to kiss Phasma. Her lips were hot and sweet. The kiss was a little too rough in the urgency of the moment. Phasma only faintly registered it before her eyes flickered closed.

\------------------------

The Millenium Falcon surpassed all of Poe’s expectations as it rattled through hyperspace. It was noisy and a little bit rough for his tastes, but it got the job done all the same. With the calculations for their destination set, there really wasn’t much to do but wait.

He leaned back against the couch in the common area, one leg up and with a look on his face that was somewhere between bored and amused. Finn was pacing the ship. He had fallen into a pattern of pacing, stopping and sitting for awhile and looking nervous, and getting up to pace some more. 

Poe drifted to sleep for a while. In his time as a pilot, he had developed a talent for being able to sleep anywhere. You never knew when a couple hours of sleep caught between missions might come in handy. Finn wasn’t as good at stealing an emergency catnap as Poe was, and Poe felt a little guilty that his friend was sitting awake nervous and scared. 

Other than sleep, there wasn’t much for them to occupy their time with. Given the danger of the situation they were launching themselves headlong into, everything they did seemed like a futile attempt at distraction. They couldn’t interact much with the other being on board. He and Finn were entirely clueless when it came to speaking Shyriiwook, and Chewbacca didn’t seem to be much of a conversationalist. They played a few rounds of holochess, but Finn had never played before and Poe had never been very good at it. Finn stood eventually and started pacing once again when it was clear they were both tired of the game.

“Do you ever think about how insane all of this is?” asked Finn when he sat down again. He couldn’t seem to keep his hands still.

Poe shrugged and Finn frowned. His expression showed that he did not believe his cool-guy nonchalance. “The galaxy has always been a bit insane. I think people in charge just try to make the rest of us believe it isn’t.”

Finn sat back in the seat, but the look he was giving Poe was unchanged. “That answer might work for some people, but in the last few weeks a lot of insane things have happened.” He swallowed and looked down at his hands. “I guess I’m finally starting to sift through it all in my head. An entire star system was destroyed. There’s some mystical power in the universe that controls everything and a couple of magic people can use it. I’m with the Resistance. I fought some kind of… Sith… Jedi… Darth Vader incarnate.” He took a second to breathe and slow down. “Sometimes it feels like I’m going crazy.” 

“Like you had this idea about how the world worked, or this faith that someone out there in the galaxy had to have some idea about what was going on, and you’re coming to realize that maybe no one has a clue?” He said it like a question, but to Finn, it sounded like the brutal truth of what he was really thinking. “Maybe it’s true.” That sounded like all Poe had to say on the matter.

“But how does anyone keep going? How do you fight the First Order and save the galaxy when no one has any idea how to do that or what to do when it’s all over?” He moved closer to Poe without thinking. Poe moved his hand to Finn’s thigh to tell him it was okay. “Nevermind,” he said. “I shouldn’t- We shouldn’t be thinking stuff like this right now.”

Poe pursed his lips. “That’s the kind of thing they would have told you as a stormtrooper. You’re allowed to have doubts, Finn. You’re only human.” 

It should have felt true, but there were times when he felt like he was only pretending to be what Poe would call ‘human’. There were times when he wanted to slip back into the mindset that he had fought against for so long. It was so much easier not to question the way things were. At times, he felt himself longing for some kind of mission to plan and carry out just so that he had some kind of clear purpose. Some dark part of him wondered if that was why he had been so eager to take on Rey’s rescue, but he knew that was ridiculous. Insecurity and doubt were two charming facets of his newly liberated personality.

“I hope you’re right,” was all he managed to say.

Poe gave him a measured look. “I think I am,” he said seriously. “You haven’t gotten the chance to breathe yet after everything that’s happened. Part of that is because you’ve been in a coma, but it’s also because you’re missing the person who has been your compass for most of this.” He looked down at his hands. “I might’ve helped you escape the First Order, but Rey was the one who helped you make sense of everything afterward. Maybe you need her.”

Finn wasn’t sure what Poe was implying. “Yeah, maybe. At the very least, I can’t let her stay where she is.”

“That’s something we can definitely agree on. I was just a pilot and the few hours I spent there were nasty.” Something in his eyes confessed that this was a massive understatement. “I can only imagine what they would do to someone important, someone with the Force.”

Some small fear that Finn had hardly given thought to rose to the surface of his mind. “They’re probably taking her to Snoke.” They would try to turn her to the dark side. They would try to make Rey another Kylo Ren, another hound to fight for the First Order and spread fear throughout the galaxy.

Poe cleared his throat and Finn was almost certain he knew what he was about to say. The slightly nervous look on Poe’s face was all he needed to be sure. “You don’t think there’s any way she would ever-”

“No,” said Finn. “There’s no way.”

That answer put an end to that discussion, but not to the persistent doubts that continued to nag Finn.

Poe went to check on their estimated arrival time and reported back to Finn that it was much sooner than either of them had expected. They had just dropped out of hyperspace and had about an hour left before they were close enough to the Finalizer to launch BB-8 in the escape pod. 

They outfitted BB-8 with a portable comm unit that Finn could use to communicate with BB-8 as he moved throughout the ship. He didn’t doubt that the little droid’s ability to be resourceful, but Finn wished that he could get on board the ship and find Rey himself. 

In the cockpit, they could already see the Finalizer. It appeared first as a speck in a sea of shining stars and bright planets. The eye glanced over it at first, until it had grown to the size of a fist, and then a head, and after that, they scrambled to get BB-8 in position. They were almost close enough to be hailed by the Finalizer and then the chase would begin. 

BB-8 fit snugly into the escape pod. They made sure the droid was able to get in and out of it on his own and placed cushions inside to help him. The escape pod was sucked out into space with a horrible loud vacuum sound. Through a viewport, they could see the small thrusters engage before it dropped out of sight.

Chewie howled from the cockpit, letting them know that the Finalizer had made contact with them already. Poe ran to answer leaving Finn in the living area, with the comm receiver clutched in his fist. It felt heavy in his hands like an anchor. Now Finn would be a compass, a beacon, trying to guide them home. He sat with his head between his knees for a moment. From here, he could listen to Poe talk to the officers on the bridge of the Finalizer. He could have sworn he heard Poe ask to speak to ‘General Hugs’. He let himself laugh nervously. This was it.

\-----------------------

Looking back on her last night on the Finalizer, Rey’s memory seemed clouded over in a haze. Everything had happened too quickly, and it seemed unbelievable when she tried to stop and recount it all. She had told Phasma that her time aboard the Finalizer felt like holding her breath between one galaxy-defining moment and the next. Her last night felt like that moment after holding your breath when the world rushes back into focus and new air fills your lungs. Afterwards, she was dizzy and disoriented but thankful for each new breath she was able to take.

When she looked down at Phasma lying asleep in her bed a wave of emotion welled up in her. It had been a last minute decision to invite her to stay the night. She hated that she had needed to use the force on her, but being able to see her one last time made it worth the guilt. She had never seen Phasma so peaceful. She wondered if anyone ever had. That morning they had spent together, Phasma had woken up before her. From her sudden response just now to even the smallest movement, it was clear she slept lightly. Rey had suspected once that very few people had ever seen her face and that fewer people had ever seen Phasma smile. Perhaps she was the only one in the galaxy who had ever seen her like this.

For a brief second the strength to keep going faltered as she placed her hand on the side of Phasma’s face and brushed her thumb along her smooth, alabaster cheek. She had such delicate pale features, soft as though lovingly sculpted by a master; a beautiful warrior. Her heart ached at the thought of never seeing her again. Phasma made a soft noise, something murmured in sleep. It was kind of adorable, but Rey instantly snapped into action at the thought that Phasma might be waking up already.

She laced up her shoes and grabbed the few items she had to herself, most of it just warmer clothes. Rey padded across the floor of the room and turned back to look at her prison just before she left. No matter how things went now, she was never coming back here.

Her knock at the door let Nine-oh outside know that she was ready. The doors slid open just as she had planned. The fluorescent lighting outside took a second to adjust to. It illuminated the smile that was already on her face from getting this far. She looked to Nine-oh and briefly hoped to see it mirrored in the stormtroopers face. She was met with the usual expressionless white and black surface of the uniform helmet. It didn’t dampen her spirits.

“Shall we?” she asked, so ready to leave. 

Nine-oh said nothing but moved in the direction of the hangar. Rey wasn’t sure whether or not she should find his silence suspicious. She knew that Nine-oh was not entirely on board with this plan. He would likely choose to stay on the Finalizer rather than come with her. At this stage of their plan, Rey no longer had the time to feel disappointed in his decision. Aside from providing a cover for Rey walking about the ship, she needed him to enter the code to release one of the TIE fighters in the hangar. After that, he could leave if he wanted. This was the moment of truth. Everything that happened from here on could help her or ruin her.

Rey kept her head down as they walked, keeping up the pretense of a prisoner being escorted. Nine-oh walked in the stiff march step of all stormtroopers. There were few people around to notice them. Their route to the hangar had been chosen carefully to avoid running into anyone on their way. With Rey’s use of the force and Nine-oh’s knowledge of shift schedules, they encountered few people.

Each step closer to the hangar made her heart beat faster. They were doing it. She had hardly needed to rely on the force to make it this far.

They paused behind a wall at one intersecting set of hallways. A group of three stormtroopers and two officers passed by that neither of them had expected. Rey could feel Nine-oh panicking beside her. She knew she was perhaps unduly confident about their situation, but felt sure that they wouldn’t be noticed.

The squadron passed them by without incident. They were so close to the hangar. In her eagerness to finally be free of this place, Rey moved ahead of Nine-oh, departing from their agreed upon plan a few steps early. She was a few doors down when she realized that Nine-oh was not following her.

She spun on her heel to see what was keeping him. Nine-oh had taken off his helmet and was leaning against the wall. 

“What’s wrong? We’re almost there.” She walked back to see what was the matter with him. There was a sheen of sweat on his forehead and his brow was furrowed almost as if in pain.

He looked down into her eyes for a moment before quickly looking away. “I can’t do this,” he said. 

“I told you before, I don’t need you to come with me.” Irritation colored her voice. “I just need you to enter the code so I can leave. We’re so close.”

Nine-oh shook his head. “You didn’t tell me about Captain Phasma. I don’t even know what you did to her.”

“She’s fine,” said Rey, exasperated. “Is that what this is about?”

He gulped, on the verge of some kind of panic attack. He shook his head again. “I can’t do this.” That was his sticking point. “We almost got caught back there. I won’t be a part of this.”

“Fine,” said Rey. She wasn’t sure what she was going to do once she reached the hangar, but she wasn’t going to let Nine-oh stop her. For a moment, she dithered on whether or not to try to compel him to go with her. He seemed too emotionally distraught for a mind trick to have much of an effect, so she decided to go on without him. Perhaps if she knew more about her abilities or had more time, she could have retrieved the code from his mind. The thought of doing it turned her stomach so she didn’t entertain that thought for long.

There was only one thing she could do now: keep going. She turned and left him there.

“Where do you think you’re going?” he called. He sounded surprised and actually a bit curious. Rey inwardly cursed how quickly he had given up on the stealth portion of their plan.

“I’m leaving with or without you. That was always the plan.” She spoke tersely and wondered if he would be shocked by that. It reminded her of being on Jakku. Things tended to happen whether you liked it or not. There was no need to be sentimental about it now.

She could feel his eyes on her as she left. He did nothing to stop her from going. The First Order would still view that as assisting Rey in her escape. She was not sure how letting her go would sit on his conscience.

Rey knew how to get to the hangar from here. They really had gotten very close. The room was nearly empty during this hour of the cycle, according to plan. Maintenance droids cleaned and inspected ships, but there were no life forms to be found. She quickly found the panel she was looking for, where a stormtrooper or an officer could input the code to approve the release of a TIE fighter. It served various other functions, but Rey was only interested in the one feature that hindered her escape. 

Her hands hovered above the screen. The interface now displayed the page she wanted, where a person who knew the access code could enter it and be on their way. She assumed that she would only be given a few tries before the system set off some kind of alarm or alerted someone. This left her with very few options.

Rey jumped when a metallic clang rang out from across the hangar. Instantly, she assumed she had been caught. Her feet moved to a fighting stance. She was desperate enough to fight anyone at this point. 

As she looked towards the sound of the noise though, she did not see an officer or a squadron of stormtroopers ready to shoot at her. She did not see anyone at all past the ships on the hangar floor between where she was and where the sound had come from. If it had been a person, Rey felt as though they would have come after her by now. They wouldn’t wait for her to make the first move, they would come in and try to take her by force.

Rey moved tentatively towards the end of the hangar where the sound had come from. She had a feeling that she hoped came from the force, that told her to investigate. Still, she knew she had to be cautious. 

When she thought she had gone as far as she could go before facing whatever had made the noise, she paused to listen. Her back was pressed against the cold metal wing of a shuttle. Beyond the sound of her own breath, she could hear smaller metallic sounds as she drew in closer, the sound of metal shifting against metal. A droid?

In one impulsive move, she turned the corner. Her mouth fell open and she barely kept herself from shouting.

“BB-8!” She knelt down next to the droid feeling as though she should give it a hug or something. 

The droid rolled up beside her and seemed to lean into the touch like a living thing. It squealed in binary. It spoke quickly about how enormously improbable the odds were of them actually finding each other on the ship were and how they had to get out of here quickly.

“I know.” The idea that the droid was even here seemed to have stopped her brain function momentarily. Her mind was completely caught up in how this could have happened. “How did you get here?”

BB-8 likely needed his expression panel rewired and his communication matrix reconfigured. Going too long without updates had caused a bug where his binary came out almost faster than Rey was able to keep up with. He told her about Finn and Poe, Chewbacca and the Millenium Falcon, before insisting again that they needed to leave.

“Right,” she said. It took a conscious effort to ignore the idea that Finn had come to try and rescue her. She had to rescue herself first. “Come with me.”

She brought BB-8 to the display she had been working on before. “In order to get fly one of those, I need a code to release the locks. Only, I haven’t got one of those.”

This was it she realized. She was getting out of here at last. With BB-8’s help, they were going to get the code from the First Order’s database and be on their way within minutes. BB-8 inserted a miniature utility arm into a port on the display panel. With any luck, BB-8 would find the information they needed.

Rey climbed up into the cockpit of her chosen TIE fighter. There was something about it that even smelled new and exciting. This was easily the most expensive ship she had ever laid her eyes on. The TIE cockpit was divided in half for a pilot and a gunner. Though she certainly found the ship impressive, in terms of function, it was not too different from the ships she had handled before. She tossed her clothes into the gunner's chair, which she supposed would also be the best spot for BB-8 now that she had to transport a droid. Rey almost laughed at the idea of teaching BB-8 how to aim and fire the blasters. 

As she surveyed the pilot controls, Rey noticed a holo display and looked through the windshield to see the connecting subspace communications antenna. A decisive yank took care of that potential problem. The offending piece of tech left a hole in the dashboard, but it was rendered useless once Rey threw it from the cockpit. They wouldn’t be able to track her now if she ever managed to get far enough out of range. 

Part of her was excited. She had seen the way TIE fighters moved. Most of her experience with the ships was colored by fear for her life, but she had also noticed just how fast and reckless they could be. She was going to need every bit of that speed and any help she could get from the force. This TIE happened to be equipped with a hyperdrive. Even now that she had BB-8, the calculations might take more time than she currently possessed. 

The plan was still a long shot, but the odds were looking a bit better. Now, she might be able to reach Finn and Poe and escape in the Millenium Falcon.

“Almost there?” Rey asked BB-8. She was still nervous even if just being inside the TIE fighter had made her feel a bit better.

The droid answered back with a sharp invective, about how it wasn’t programmed for slicing.

“Just hurry,” she added.

She hardly listened when BB-8 responded to that. 

Rey snapped off the subspace communication antenna on the TIE fighter. If she planned on flying it longer than the few minutes she was going to have before she was either shot down or reunited with Finn, not having the antenna would pose a problem. Rey decided she would be better if the Finalizer was unable to track her or communicate with her once she was on the run.

Another sound accompanied the echo of the antenna’s metallic snap. Boots on metal and a voice.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

Rey closed her eyes. She had hoped for more time. She had wanted to avoid this altogether. The sound of her voice was instantly recognizable to her. She had dreamed of it once. 

What could she possibly say to Phasma now? That moment of softness that she had left behind in her room was what she wanted to remember. Maybe she had been foolish to want to remember a fictional version of what Phasma had been. This was closer to the real thing.

She turned to see Phasma standing there, looking almost as she had when she had left her. She was wearing the same black clothes and no shoes, as though she had run from Rey’s room the instant she had been released from Rey’s trance. The sweet, open expression on her face from before was gone and replaced by something Rey couldn’t read. Perhaps she felt anger, something hard and hot to hold onto. Perhaps she felt betrayed after everything they had been through. Perhaps she wasn’t quite sure what to feel; the same predicament Rey found herself in.

BB-8 screeched and swiveled his head to see who had caught them. Rey raised a hand to calm him, which she also hoped he interpreted as a sign to keep working.

“You knew this was coming,” said Rey, simply. It sounded stronger than she felt.

Phasma shook her head. “Maybe I did. I guess I hoped it would never come to this.”

“You can’t stop me.” It wasn’t a threat. Part of it might not even be true. Phasma could signal some guard or call out. She could try to fight Rey and have a chance at winning. There were a number of ways Phasma could foil this poorly crafted plan, held together by hope and luck.

But Phasma hadn’t done any of that yet, and Rey couldn’t understand why the woman was still standing there. 

“I think I loved you.” She had admitted something similar earlier, but this time it was in the past tense. Something in Phasma had decided that their time together was over.

Rey held firm. “I think I loved you, too.” She didn’t quite know what to call the feelings she had for Phasma. Affection and attraction were inadequate words to describe what she had felt over the last few weeks. Love seemed as good a word as any for it. 

She could almost feel the steps Phasma took towards her. One, two. “You don’t have to do this.” It looked as though Phasma was holding herself back from reaching out to her. Rey had never seen Phasma in action as captain of the stormtroopers. She had never seen the way Phasma held herself when there was something difficult to be done. Even now she found something new about the woman to admire. “What was your plan?”

Rey looked briefly at the TIE fighter and the antenna still in her hand. 

Phasma spoke calmly, but with force, “Rey, that’s suicide. You won’t make it ten seconds once they send a squadron after you.” 

Rey’s head snapped up when she heard that, running the words through her head again to make sure she had heard it right. You won’t make it ten seconds. Will. Not. Something about that sounded as though Phasma wasn’t going to stop her, but Rey didn’t dare get her hopes up. 

“I’m not staying here, Phasma. You know that.”

Phasma shook her head. “And you’ll fight anyone who tries to get in your way. If anyone but me had caught you here, you’d already be at their throats. A hundred stormtroopers could come in here to take you away and you would fight until you couldn’t fight anymore.”

She didn’t know what to say. Rey stepped forward to meet Phasma. Their arms instinctively wrapped around each other. Rey kissed the bare skin at Phasma’s neck and Phasma shivered in her arms. Please don’t make me fight you, it seemed to say.

Despite everything, Phasma found she agreed. She gave herself one last moment like this, with Rey tucked to her chest before she steeled herself for what she was about to do.

Rey was shocked when Phasma was the first to pull away. Part of her had wondered if she was stepping into a trap by falling into Phasma’s arms again. Phasma had that same impassive look on her face as though she was going into battle. She marched over to the panel and Rey told BB-8 to put away his arc welder, which he was dangerously close to using on Phasma. Their time was up whether or not Phasma decided to call for reinforcements.

BB-8 was reluctant to comply. His utility arm spun and retracted from the port reluctantly. Rey held her breath and waited to see what Phasma was going to do. She couldn’t see the screen from where she was standing, just Phasma standing in front of it. 

There was a loud clunk that came from the TIE fighter next to her. The sound of the locks disengaging. Rey wanted to run forward and hug Phasma again, but she held herself back. This was too good to be true, it had to be.

Phasma turned around, her composure was broken at last. “Go,” she commanded. “Don’t say anything just get out of here.” 

Rey didn’t say anything. BB-8 squealed and rolled over to the TIE fighter. He didn’t know who this was that had helped them and didn’t particularly care. The droid couldn’t get into the ship by himself and needed Rey to lift him up. 

She felt frozen in place. Rey had never let herself imagine that Phasma might do anything but stop her if she found out that she planned on escaping. Perhaps if Rey had asked outright, Phasma would have found the strength to refuse her. The fact that Rey had never asked might have made a difference. She never pushed their relationship too far. She had let it grow and shift naturally into something neither of them expected. 

A few more beeps from BB-8 broke the spell that held her in place. She turned and heaved BB-8 up the ladder and into the gunner’s chair. Then she moved into her own position in the pilot’s chair. Her hands were sweating as she looked down at the controls. 

Shaking, she flicked a few switches which started the navigation systems and board controls. Then she activated the deflector shields. She steadfastly avoided looking through the viewport as she worked. She didn’t want to know what Phasma was doing, what she was thinking. She spared a few seconds to reroute power from the high yield energy cells to the engine and onboard systems. BB-8 was resourceful, but she wasn’t about to trust him to fire back at the TIEs she knew would pursue them. Instead, she was trying to make them even the slightest bit faster. 

Then she was done. Everything was ready and she couldn’t wait any longer. She ignited the engine and felt the ship lift off from the flight deck. 

\-----------------------------------------  
Phasma had woken up in the dark confused and angry. She wasn’t sure who she was most angry with, but she liked it. It gave her direction and purpose. Phasma knew what she needed to do.

There was a security protocol that allowed superior officers in and out of cells. She wasn’t trapped there the way Rey had been for so long. 

She deliberated even as she strode down the hallway, though the end result was inevitable. Rey would almost certainly be found in the nearest hangar bay. By the time she stepped inside, the decision had been made.

Rey had planned an escape. The idea didn’t surprise her as much as it ought to. When Rey put that thought into words, Phasma knew it was true. The girl seemed to know everything about her by now in a way that was both dangerous and thrilling. That was why she had closed herself off to everyone, anyone, for so long. When people got close to you, they could read you, know you, and manipulate you. 

This didn’t feel like manipulation though. In this, as in so many other ways, Rey was different. 

Her feelings were difficult to parse even when Rey stepped toward her and they were once again in each other’s arms. It should have been a relief, something to covet, but she couldn’t wait for it to be over. Their time was up and there was something she needed to do.

Despite the dread she felt in her chest, she almost smiled when Rey seemed shocked. It seemed Phasma still had the ability to surprise her. She fought back the desire to take Rey back into her arms and keep her there, to undo everything she was about to do and steal her away. 

She didn’t though. She stood there silently, watching Rey climb into the TIE fighter and make preparations. It hadn’t stopped feeling inevitable, as though she still didn’t have control over the situation. Letting Rey go was a choice, but one she felt she had to make. Nothing about it was easy.

Phasma thought she caught Rey’s eyes through the viewport once before she left. The TIE fighter’s engines revved themselves into a roar and the ship lifted off from the hangar floor. She was gone now. At last, the situation was out of her hands. Their eyes met and Phasma wondered if Rey was trying to tell her something even now in this look. It was brief and seemed to be spoken in a language Phasma couldn’t understand and it was over before she could even try to comprehend. 

TIE fighters were notorious for their reckless speed and Rey was gone in an instant.

Phasma thought she should move. She should leave to avoid being implicated in the crime. Her instinct for self-preservation fought to keep her safe even now that she had done the unthinkable. It was useless. There was no escaping what she had done. The moment anyone tried to investigate what had happened they would know what she had done. She might as well stand there in the hangar, bare-faced, defenseless. They might as well know that she didn’t regret what she had done.

It took five minutes for the alarm to sound. Phasma wondered absently if that had been enough time. The response time had been absolutely abysmal, but then this was during General Hux’s rest cycle and Captain Peavey would not have been equipped to deal with this efficiently. Perhaps her head wouldn’t be the only one on the chopping block. 

A unit of pilots scrambled past her to get to their ships. Each of them was too busy to give her a second look for being where she shouldn’t be. 

The hangar looked so empty when they left. Phasma moved at last to the wide bay doors. They were open and the only thing separating her from void was the Finalizer’s gravity generator and atmo-stabilizer. It was impossible to see anything she really wanted to see from here. All she could see were stars and a planet closer to them than any of the millions of others. She couldn’t see the TIE fighters. Whether or not Rey escaped now was beyond her control. Perhaps it was for the best that she couldn’t see what was happening. 

Part of her was certain that Rey would escape. The girl had this indomitable, immortal spirit that couldn’t be conquered. She was the sort of person who didn’t Phasma’s instinct for survival because she didn’t seem like the sort of person who could ever do something as mundane as die. 

Phasma walked back to her own rooms at her own pace. She didn’t let one person distract her along the way. She knew she was shell-shocked. People she had fought beside, troopers who served beneath her had looked this way before. They all had blank looks on their faces and acted as though they couldn’t hear you. 

It was silly really. Phasma hadn’t been in battle. She hadn’t watched Rey die. Perhaps she could have handled that. After all, she was far more accustomed to that than any of what had just happened.

When she was alone in her rooms, nothing about her had changed. At least, the quiet, stillness of her surroundings matched what she felt inside. It was almost nice, returning to the way she handled these sorts of things before; back to being able to cut those parts off from herself whenever they grew troublesome and painful. She felt in control even though she couldn’t seem to make herself move.

Her comm went off at some point. A laugh grew in her chest and burst out suddenly, madly. She didn’t look to see what it said or who it was from. Perhaps they were hunting her down already. 

She didn’t remember how she first learned that Rey had escaped. Whoever or whatever it was simply confirmed what she already believed to be true. 

It took hours for Phasma to start to feel anything again. She was lying down on her bed in the dark, hardly noticing the way her stupid comm would light up with messages every so often. Only when it stopped alerting her to new messages and the door to her room slid open of its own accord did Phasma start to think again. Only then did it become real. 

The laugh returned for a moment but she was able to stop it this time. 

_What have I done?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are at the end! It took me longer than I expected to get this out, but I should have known this one would be harder than most to finally let go of. Thank you so much for reading this fic. I really can't believe that it's over, that this thing I've had in my head for well over a year at this point is finally out there for other people to read. Thank you so much to everybody who has commented and left kudos and especially to you guys who have commented on almost every chapter. You really helped encourage me to keep writing and see this through to the end. 
> 
> I hinted last chapter that you might notice the chapter count of this fic go up by the time I posted this and if you didn't notice at the top, well, it has! Which means there will be an epilogue for this that I think wraps the whole story up rather nicely (no spoilers here).
> 
> I hope to have it posted in two weeks so I'll save my real tears until then.


	15. Epilogue

General Hux looked up from his datapad when Phasma entered his quarters. Otherwise, he did not stir from his ice blue couch. His head tilted slightly when Phasma did not automatically take the seat opposite him, as was customary when they met like this. 

“I heard you finished reconditioning today,” he began. He spoke in a casual, lofty tone, the one he used when he wanted to sound like he knew everything. “The medical technicians say that you’ve completely recovered from your emotional break.”

“Yes, sir.” Phasma’s voice was tight and impassive. She wasn’t sure how she felt about the medical technicians or their methods of psychoanalysis. She wasn’t sure she could say that she felt better either. She could function now; that was an improvement. 

Hux had come to her room himself after the incident. Phasma didn’t really remember much about that. Everything that happened at the end of that night was a blur. She was almost surprised that she had made it all the way back to her quarters. 

“Phasma, I want you to know that I don’t blame you,” said Hux. Phasma couldn’t read the tone of his voice, as he likely intended. “Everything that happened was my fault. I should never have put you in that position.” She knew he meant it to be a comfort, but in that moment she hated him. They had known each other for years. Phasma knew how much Hux loved to be right and loved knowing more than everyone else in the room. Usually, it was true. His status granted him access to nearly everything he could ever want to know. He was wrong about this though.

Hux wanted Phasma’s choice to have been something he could have controlled if he had cared enough. By letting Rey go, Phasma had shown him that she had a mind of her own, that she wasn’t just another cog in his great machine. He was giving her the chance to fall back in line, but Phasma wasn’t sure what she wanted anymore.

“Thank you, sir.” Reconditioning had made her voice flat and even once again. She had hated every second of the process, but was grateful that it had restored her composure. 

From his seat on the couch, Hux looked up at her, studying her face. Officers in the mess hall likened this look of his to a snake, cold and predatory. Phasma tended to think he looked more like a cat toying with a mouse. He wasn’t totally ignorant then, Phasma realized. Hux was testing her, trying to get a read on what she was like now and what had caused her to do what she had done that night three weeks ago.

Three weeks. The time that had passed was almost longer than she had known Rey in total. How strange that one period of time could mean so much and another so little? And wasn’t it strange how their time together seemed so short and the last few weeks had stretched to years?

Hux made a thoughtful noise, signaling the end of his musings. “Phasma, take a seat for a moment. There is something I would like to discuss.”

On her way to his quarters, Phasma wondered if this would be a purely social visit. Now she knew that there was a more official agenda at work. She did as he asked and took the chair opposite him. He watched her, studying even this simple motion. In a sort of power play, he hadn’t moved from his reclined position on the couch. His posture never relaxed despite the informal black robe and his feet propped up on the cushions. It was some way of saying that even in leisure he was every inch the General.

“What I am about to tell you does not come directly from me. The rest of high command has insisted I act despite my reluctance.” Even as he spoke, she knew he was studying the microexpressions of her face. She wasn’t sure what he was looking for yet. “The Supreme Leader has not been informed, but I’m sure his feelings would fall in line with theirs if he knew.”

“Spit it out,” said Phasma. Part of her knew what was coming. She and Hux had maintained a kind of partnership throughout her time here. They kept each other’s secrets. She had carried out his dirty work on more than one occasion. For his part, he kept her high position secure. After Starkiller, when someone needed to be blamed for lowering the shields on the base and all evidence pointed to her, Hux had taken her side. They had protected each other, but his protection wouldn’t be enough this time.

The corners of Hux’s mouth quirked up into an almost smile. The fire in her voice had returned for a moment and he was glad to see it wasn’t gone completely. Still, he remained sober. “You are demoted, effective immediately.”

She should have been prepared to hear that, and yet the words hit like a blaster bolt. Her face hardened as she swallowed this information. She had been with the First Order for nearly fifteen years and had been Captain Phasma for almost all of that time. This position was her life and everyone knew it. Was she meant to serve beneath someone else now? Who?

“I tried to prevent this, but after what happened and your breakdown, the others refused to be swayed.” It was so strange to hear him try to comfort her. She found it wholly ineffective.

Phasma wasn’t sure what to say. The consequences of being demoted kept unfurling in her mind. She was going to be humiliated by everyone she worked with. The few just below her in the chain of command were going to be completely intolerable. They would all see her as weak, as having not been good enough, as having always been secretly useless. Many members of the First Order, those trying to claw their way up the ranks, which amounted to practically everyone, saw demotion as a punishment worse than death. The First Order doesn’t give second chances to those who fail so severely.

Before, when her place as Captain seemed secure beyond a doubt, she had thought their constant infighting and scheming over rank to be petty and childish. She understood their ambition but thought that constant backstabbing would ultimately prove to be detrimental to the organization as a whole. Now, she understood them better. They were sharks, constantly moving forward in order to survive. There was no such thing as staying still. If you remained in one place for too long, you drowned.

“I-I..” _I can’t,_ she wanted to say, but the words wouldn’t come. She couldn’t see a way forward for her; not any way that mattered. After everything, she thought she’d rather die. Losing her place as Captain seemed to amount to the same thing.

Hux gave her a look somewhere between sympathy and telling her to spit out whatever she was trying to say, as she had said to him moments ago. His face flickered between the two emotions before settling into something blank; not a mixture of the two but a neutral ground.

Her throat had gone dry. She swallowed and tried again. “I can’t do that. I won’t.” Phasma gained strength from hearing her refusal out loud. “That would be a waste and you know it. You know where I’m best suited, everyone does.” A growl wrenched itself from her throat. She felt feral, angry for the first time in too long. 

“Lieutenant Tazza has been promoted in your absence. I’ve been supervising the transition.” Phasma rarely spared a thought for those below her. She had no ill feelings towards the Lieutenant, just that she would end the woman’s life in a second if it meant everything could go back to the way it had been. 

Phasma couldn’t sit still anymore. She stood and paced a few steps around the room. It was at times like this that she felt claustrophobic in space. Every room onboard was like this one: too small, too dark, and with very little to take her anger out on. She spied a few glass bottles and some of Hux’s personal effects. Their life expectancy might suddenly become very short.

“Is that what I am now? A lieutenant?” She had found her voice now. The sound felt drawn out of this gaping hole in her chest. It was an invisible wound, but one that put fire in her veins like any other.

Hux nodded curtly. “You’ll manage a tenth of the squadrons you’re used to overseeing and you’ll report to Captain Tazza.”

Phasma knew how the rest of that arrangement was supposed to work. She had received enough briefings from lieutenants herself. On her holopad there was still a report from Lieutenant Tazza dated back a few weeks ago. 

“And there’s nothing that can be done about her?” asked Phasma, savagely. 

The thin, cruel smile on Hux’s face told her that he understood what she meant. “I’m afraid not,” he said, really sounding as though he wished things could be that simple. “If Tazza were to be removed so quickly, suspicions would be aroused and if I can’t have you as my Captain, Tazza is the best alternative.”

She couldn’t be sure if he was flattering her or not. It wasn’t in his style to say things he didn’t mean, but it also wasn’t like him to attempt apology. 

Phasma wasn’t sure what she could say anymore. She turned away from him, unable to look at that stupid taciturn expression of his. Her breathing was getting away from her and all she wanted to do was hit something. If she had to watch Hux stare at her for a moment longer, with something that smacked of pity, the thing she hit was going to be him.

People had looked at Phasma as though she was broken; her own brother for one, a long time ago. They looked at her as though she was missing something vital inside of her, something soft and malleable to hold all of her sharp pieces together. There was never a time when she had agreed with those people. She wasn’t broken. Phasma knew she was strong and her strength was never in her ability to hold herself together through hardship. Her strength was never measured in how much she could endure. 

No, her strength lay in knowing how to survive and how to move forward. For her, there had always been a clear path. She seized opportunity when she saw it and hunted what she wanted until it was hers. Perhaps it was the same ambition that drove the First Order. Perhaps it was something uniquely Phasma’s. Regardless, that steadfast compass, the little voice that had guided her all her life had gone silent. She felt cut off, disconnected, and for the first time in a very long time, weak.

She hardly felt it when her fist smashed through the crystal decanters on Hux’s shelf. They broke against her hand and shattered again when the pieces hit the floor. Sharp fragments were stuck in her hand. Blood and liquor painted the floor. The small shards stung her hands but distracted her from the rest of what she was feeling.

She was proud too, when she realized she had roused Hux from the couch.

Her hand hurt a little. Compared to most of the injuries she had sustained in her life this was nothing. Phasma held her hand up to see exactly what she had done. Her right hand was covered in red. With an experimental flex of her fingers, she felt every piece of glass that was embedded in her skin.

“That’s enough,” said Hux, quietly. Phasma didn’t care enough to try to figure out the deeper meaning in his inflection. “I have something else I need to say and I need you to listen.” His words were soft but he said them with a strict, icy bite. It was a command regardless of the words he used.

Phasma squeezed her eyes shut, not sure she could listen anymore. 

“I have a proposition for you, an alternative to demotion perhaps.” Phasma knew Hux was delighting in the shocked look on her face. “If you are interested,” He was toying with her now. “Would you please sit back down and stop breaking my possessions?”

She didn’t do a thing to pretend she wasn’t still angry. She was practically bristling with it. As she sat down slowly, she stared right back at him. Her anger made her suspicious of everyone, especially him. Hux sat down on his couch, feet planted on the ground this time and hands folded in his lap.

“I am offering you the opportunity to leave the Order for a time, on a mission you would perform for me directly.” This sounded good so far, almost too good to be true. He seemed to realize her excitement and decided to temper it. “You know that if anyone but you had done this they would be dead by now, found guilty of treason. However, we’ve always had a special relationship, you and I. One might almost call it friendship.” 

Someone else might have been offended by that description, but Phasma found it verging on a sentimentality that neither she nor Hux usually possessed. “Thank you,” said Phasma, and despite how little she trusted him, she found that she meant it.

“I think it would be in everyone’s best interest if you left the Finalizer for a time and as it happens there is an errand I think you might find yourself especially well-suited for. As you might assume, the loss of the girl, Rey, was quite a blow to us. It was a humiliation, one that has hit Kylo Ren particularly hard.” There was something in his voice that spoke of long-winded suffering on his part. The two of them had forged a strange and close relationship. Individually, they were a nightmare to deal with when they were upset but Phasma tried not to imagine being in the same room as them when both of them had been slighted. 

Phasma nodded, acknowledging this terrible thing she was responsible for. They both knew she was responsible. There was no need to rehash the obvious. 

“I should mention that he doesn’t blame you either,” Hux continued. “I believe he’s been too distracted by the girl’s escape to find someone to blame it on. And I pride myself on having been quick to delete the security footage from that night. The rest of high command doesn’t have any solid proof that it was you who let her escape, which is why your punishment is so lenient. _I_ know it was you and that’s really all that matters.”

It was more than she could have asked him to do for her. She should have known her actions would have consequences. Why hadn’t she thought about any of this wretchedness in the moment?

For most of her life, she had believed that it was made up. Her people on the Scyre had a word for it, a simple word for something their people believed was powerful, life-saving. She had been surprised to learn that the people of the FIrst Order had a word that meant the same thing. How could such a concept have fooled beings so universally? What kind of galactic scam had wormed its way into the cold hearts of these brutally unsentimental imperials? 

Love had gotten past her defenses too, like an agent of disease. She could have held off against an invasion forever, but Rey had been something quiet and unassuming; something she should never have underestimated. Phasma was disarmed from the start, taken in immediately by this young woman with spirit and fight in her even when her situation seemed beyond hope. Much as she had tried to stay away, she found herself drawn in by Rey’s light and, it was impossible not to mention, how attracted she was to her physically.

Hux was watching her again, slightly bemused. Phasma realized that her mind had wandered and he’d noticed. “As I was saying, I have a job for you, one that you would perform almost completely outside of the Order’s chain of command.”

“Except for you,” said Phasma, trying to prove that she was listening now. 

“Except for me,” he confirmed. Hux leaned forward on the couch. It seemed he was finally getting down to business. Phasma was anxious to hear what kind of job he had reserved for her. “You’ll go out alone and without official authority, which means I can provide you with little in the way of supplies and weaponry.” He smiled slightly. “Though I suppose you wouldn’t have it any other way. Flying solo has always been your style hasn’t it?”

He was getting off track and Phasma opened her mouth to tell him to get back to the point. Hux gave her a glare which shut her mouth quickly, at least for the moment. “You’ll report directly to me, should you choose to take on this task.

Phasma had had enough of this. “Stop playing games. Of course I’ll do it, as if that was ever a question.”

She was entirely unprepared for what he said next, after giving her a measured look. “I want you to hunt down Rey and bring her back.” 

All of the feelings Phasma had been learning to suppress for the last three weeks welled up at once. Most of all she felt panic. Her eyes widened. Her pulse raced. But Phasma knew, in the same way that she had known the night she let Rey go, that there was only one thing she could do. All at once the way forward was set and the part of her that kept fighting no matter what spoke to her once again. 

“Yes,” she said, entirely without meaning to. “I’ll do it.”

She didn’t pause to question what Hux’s motivations for letting her go might be. Maybe he wanted to get rid of her and had enough sympathy in him to spare her the indignity of an assassination attempt. Perhaps he was really naive enough to believe that she would obey him even after her latest and most shameless betrayal yet. 

The job Hux had offered her was an escape pod if she wanted it. He didn’t care whether she came back or not, whether she was loyal or not, or whether she succeeded in this suicidal mission or not. Hux had decided to cut his losses with her. Phasma had become a liability and this was a test. He didn’t care whether she passed or failed, that was entirely up to Phasma.

She had been loyal to the First Order for fifteen years. Only recently had she started to question that loyalty. The first signs of doubt had come before she had met Rey, when she had put her own life ahead of the Order. It hadn’t felt treacherous at the time; it still felt like the most natural thing for her to have done. She had never pretended to have given up her killer survival instinct. If she betrayed the order now, it wouldn’t be because it was the righteous thing to do. She had outgrown them, there were better things out there in the galaxy for her.

This really was the happiest ending she could have asked for.

Their eyes met for a moment and Phasma couldn’t comprehend the understanding they came to, but it was almost a palpable thing. They could pretend that Phasma was coming back. He could pretend to be surprised later when she didn’t come back. He would truly be surprised if she did come back. There wasn’t much of a choice to be made. Staying was the same as death and going… Nothing about leaving was a certainty, but there was some amount of hope in it.

Hope. It was a funny little thing, wasn’t it? Rey had been full of it, bursting with it even. It let her smile even while she was caged up here. Phasma had thought it was silly at first, to hope in the face of unbelievable odds and yet, Rey wasn’t here anymore. 

Maybe she would find Rey. Phasma thought as she and Hux walked to a secluded hangar. She had a small bag with her things. Her chrome armor would have to stay behind. It was simply too impractical to take with her. Hux had provided her with a small sum of credits. She would find a way of making more; she was resourceful that way. 

She had been provided a small private ship and now she had the whole galaxy spread out before her. Would she be able to find Rey? Would Rey want to see her if she did manage to track her down? 

When Phasma had left Parnassos with Brendol Hux and watched the planet’s surface fall away from view she had felt a sense of purpose and opportunity. She felt something similar now gazing out at the open starry sky, but it was tinged with that hope and something she had come to know as fear. There was nothing certain about the path in front of her, but she was ready to set out on it.

She wondered briefly if she deserved any of this. Surely, for all that she’d done she didn’t deserve this heady feeling of hope, this uncertain opportunity, and the chance to truly do whatever she wanted. Things like that were meant for people like Rey who had never done a thing in her life to deserve all of the awful things that had happened to her and who continued to meet those awful things with kindness and bravery. They weren’t meant for people who had killed thoughtlessly, heartlessly; for people who were selfish and cared only for their own lives; certainly not for her.

Without too much care, Phasma chose a star system. She had a bit of intel Hux had been able to provide her with, but it really wasn’t much to go on. The hyperspace calculations would take a moment. As it loaded, Phasma decided that she would have the rest of her life to decide whether she deserved happiness, whether the galaxy even worked based on what a person deserved. So far as she could tell, it didn’t.

The calculations finished quickly enough. There was a familiar rumble under her feet as the shift picked up speed until it reached hyperspace. She spared a brief look at the Finalizer before she left. In the military, you never learned to call one place home for very long before you left it behind, but she supposed it was more of a home than she had ever been allowed to have. She knew she wouldn’t miss it though.

Phasma leaned back in the pilot’s chair and closed her eyes for a moment. She felt safe in a way that she couldn’t recall feeling in a long time. Her life was in her own hands and she had the entire expanse of the galaxy in front of her. It was time to figure out what else was out there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And it's finished! I almost can't believe it. This story has been so long in the making and now it's just... done. 
> 
> I want to thank everyone that has commented on this story and left kudos, especially those of you who left comments on almost every chapter as I was writing this. You guys are the ones who really inspired me to push through and finish what I started, and you're the reason why this chapter took so long to get out because I really wanted it to be worth it for you.
> 
> I am so sorry about the sort of cliffhanger I left you guys on last chapter. I hope this epilogue makes for a happier ending.
> 
> I know I've put this info in some of the previous chapters but I'll leave it here too. You can always find me on tumblr [@keep-on-leggin](https://keep-on-leggin.tumblr.com) and on twitter [@a_ginger_midget](https://twitter.com/a_ginger_midget). I'm always open to prompts and talking about star wars. Come talk to me!
> 
> Thanks again for sticking with me and this story all the way through to the end!


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